


As the Sea Calls

by MoonRaven1412



Category: Naruto
Genre: Chuunin Exams, F/M, Konoha Village, Self-Insert, Silver Queen's Dreaming of Sunshine Universe, Suna Village, give me some good tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2018-01-17
Packaged: 2019-01-25 00:51:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 36,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12519176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MoonRaven1412/pseuds/MoonRaven1412
Summary: 'Nautical Mile' was a ridiculous name if you live in desert. But it was derived from family tradition. And it was her new name. Kairi. New name, new life, new family... In a world of ninjas that wasn't canon after all. Now, if only she'd get that promotion.Dreaming of Sunshine universe instead of canon. SI-OC, Self-Insert. I hope you like.





	1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1.**   
  


Slim but calloused fingers shuffled a deck of playing cards with great dexterity. Parts of the deck were flipped over and then back to a different place, occasionally the entire deck was sent from one hand to other. At times she drew sets of cards from the deck. Always full poker hands before mixing them back into the deck. The audience followed the proceedings in awe. They had never seen anything like that.

“I fancy myself a magician. Not that it matters.” The girl shuffling the cards stated. “But you wanted to know my background… I guess I could tell you. Most of the key players are already dead so it doesn’t really matter if some outsiders hear this too…”

Three cards were drawn from the deck. Aces of Clubs, Spades and Diamonds. After a moment of consideration Ace of Hearts and Joker were drawn too.

“These…” The girl said, showing the cards to her audience. “Represent the five ninja villages…”

“Sunagakure…” The Ace of Spades was thrown on the ground a bit to her left, like it was a shuriken. It stuck up from one of the corners.

“Iwagakure…” The Ace of Diamonds got stuck two meters before her.

“Konohagakure…” The Ace of Clubs to her immediate right.

“Kirigakure…” The Ace of Hearts a bit further away in the right.

“And Kumogakure…” The Joker was where the same lines from Ace of Diamonds and Hearts crossed.

“The story itself begins around the time the Second Great Shinobi war was about to begin. Border skirmishes raised the tensions and smaller nations were dreading to become stampeding grounds. Our story begins from small village in Ishi no Kuni, where a family of three lived.”

Five cards were drawn.

“Mother and father…” Queen and King of Hearts. “And their three sons.” Jacks of Spades, Clubs and Diamonds.

“They were a happy family, with a little quirk. Despite them living amidst of stone and sand, all of their names were related to water and sea. The parents were Shizue and Kishi. The sons… Well, I get to their names later.

“During the years the parents worriedly talked about what to do if the war broke out. Or what to do if anything happened to the village in general. They agreed to flee to one of the bigger nations and from there help with the war effort. They understood that the likelihood of Ishi no Kuni making it out in one piece was very slim and the survival of civilians even slimmer. It was a miracle the land even existed after the first war…

“Unfortunately, they never managed to get as far as to discuss to which country they’d flee to. So when their village was torn apart by shinobi, thus was the family also struck apart.”

The girl threw the Jack of Spades by the corresponding Ace.

“The eldest son, only seven-years old at the time. Made his way south, to Sunagakure where he joined the Shinobi School as it was known at the time. He eventually fell in love and married and had a daughter. He lived through two wars and was killed during peacetime while on patrol. Only his summon came back to report what had happened.”

The King of Hearts and Jack of Diamonds were thrown by the Ace representing Iwagakure.

“The father headed over the mountains to north to Iwagakure with the middle son. Once there he signed up his reluctant son to the Ninja Training Facility while he himself joined merchant caravan as a guard. He may have been a mere civilian but he knew how to fight and how to defend himself and the goods of the caravans much better than the merchants themselves. He was killed during the Second War. Meanwhile, the middle son made it through the war as a genin and joined explosion corps eventually. With his Fuuton techniques he surprised enemies and gave cover for his fellows. One of those were woman from Shiroishi clan who had Bakuton kekkei genkai herself. They fell in love and he took his wife’s familyname. They had a daughter and later a son too while the Third War raged. The wife died and some years back the boy became a missing nin, but the middle son and his daughter are still alive.”

The girl lifted the final two cards and threw them. Queen of Hearts landed to the area of the imaginary Hi no Kuni while Jack of Clubs stuck next to Ace of Clubs.

“The mother took the youngest son, only three at the time, with her to Hi no Kuni. On the way, she fell severely ill though and passing on she gave her son to a pair of Konoha-nin who took the boy to their village and placed him to an orphanage. Eventually the boy joined the Ninja Academy and graduated at the top of his class, even a year early. He exceeded all expectations placed on him and became top shinobi and his name was whispered in fear during the Third Shinobi War. He married happily too and had a child but died soon after with his wife…”

The girl seemed to consider what to say next. One of the audience spoke up. The Nara boy.

“Did the brothers ever meet during the wars? Iwa was against both Suna and Konoha in second war while during the third war Konoha had a tentative alliance with Suna.”

“…They did. The middle brother and the youngest brother did during the third war and it almost resulted in the death of the middle brother. The youngest… didn’t remember his family anymore. How he could’ve? He was only three when he lost them all and was then thrust into a new environment where he had a lot to see and learn. He still carried their surname while the other two had left it behind.”

“What is the name then?” A girl asked this time. She was the Nara boy’s sister. The storyteller remained quiet as she let chakra strings to snap up the cards scattered on the ground and shuffled them back to the deck. She drew the three Jacks again then.

“The brothers were… Kaito…” Jack of Spades was laid neatly on the ground in front of her. “Arashi…” Jack of Diamonds. “And Minato…” Jack of Clubs. “They were the Namikazes.”

The storyteller girl smiled, sun glinting from her hitai-ate bearing Sunagakure’s symbol. Her green eyes closed as she tilted her head. “My name is Namikaze Kairi. Nice to meet you.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The official first chapter. The previous one was prologue and flashforward at the same time.

**Chapter 2.**   
  


Her name was Kairi. It meant ‘nautical mile’ which was incredibly ironic considering that she lived in the middle of desert. Then again, her father was named Kaito(ocean-soar) and he wasn’t originally from Suna so that could probably be forgiven…

Not.

It wasn’t like Kairi was ashamed or embarrassed of her name it was just… It was ridiculous considering the circumstances. (Not to mention that one of the protagonists of Kingdom Hearts games had the same name.)

Kaito was a wonderful father. Had been. Now it was just Kairi and her mother who worked as a desk-shinobi for Kazekage-sama after her legs had been crippled on a mission. While using prosthetics and thus able to move around the village, she was now unable to take missions.

Oh, did you get confused?

It was the world of a manga called Naruto, that Kairi lived in now. In Sunagakure located in Kaze no Kuni. Previously she had been living on earth, in ‘our world’, where Naruto was just a story and Kairi was called Katie.

She liked doing card tricks and playing poker and divining from playing cards. Usually she started shuffling a deck whenever she needed to think or was otherwise bored. In the other words she always carried a deck or two with her and that fact didn’t change in her new world either.

The girl didn’t remember dying. She knew she had though. But it was alright. It didn’t matter to her and honestly she was glad to live without having some sort of trauma at the background. At first she hadn’t really remembered her previous life either. It was only when Kairi was five years old that things started to trickle back. Five was the age that she was enrolled to Suna’s Shinobi School and the year her mother got crippled. It was the age she properly interacted with children around her physical age.

Her memories of her previous life were vague. Meaning that her personal memories were vague even if her personality and knowledge were intact. Kairi remembered things she’d read and learnt while she did not remember where she used to live or what her mother’s name was. But it didn’t matter. New life, new chance, et cetera…

It probably should’ve unnerved her. The clarity with which she remembered the characters and plot of Naruto. All the details from wikia-site and databooks. It was like she had an archive in her head in relation of this world.

“Just because I know _a_ world, doesn’t mean that I’m in _the_ world.” It wasn’t the pure Kishimoto-Naruto world for Kairi. Nope. That was proven when she heard the story of her father’s family. To think that she was related to Yondaime Hokage… But it didn’t matter. Minato-jisan died in the Kyuubi attack. Kairi had been three at the time.

In the end a lot of things didn’t matter.

Kairi went to the Shinobi School. She was on the same class with Kazekage’s daughter Temari. She didn’t interact with the proud girl. Instead, Kairi spent time on her own until graduating at eleven years old. She was talented in ninjutsu and under a jounin instructor, began learning Fuuton techniques.

On that year she met with her father’s brother in Iwagakure, Arashi, and his daughter Reika and son Deidara who was the same age and Kairi. Later that year Kaito was killed during a mission. Even later that year Kairi participated in chuunin exams where none of her teammates got promoted.

In the following years Kairi went on missions and got stronger. She went to chuunin exams where both of her team mates were promoted on and then the genin that composed the makeshift teams later on. But never her.

It didn’t matter. Kairi wanted to live. She didn’t care if she remained genin forever as long as she got money to live and remained alive. Her village didn’t value her and she knew it. Otherwise she probably could’ve gotten a field-promotion.

Then four years had passed on and the chuunin exams were in Konoha. Kairi decided that would be a good opportunity to see if there was any other differences between this world and the original one.

She found one. And that girl was making waves already.

She found Nara Shikako.

* * *

Kairi brushed her sun-bleached blonde hair and pulled it on a bun at the back of her head. It was sloppy and messy but also perfect in her humble opinion. She stuck two long hair sticks through it. They didn’t serve a purpose to keep the bun intact but to be her emergency weapons. The two sticks, decorated with carvings of pine, plum and bush clover. The plants from Hanafuda cards for January, February and July. The birth months of Minato, Arashi and Kaito. Kairi herself was born in May. That was the month of iris.

Two locks reaching her collarbones tumbled down. Kairi huffed. For a reason or other they never agreed to stay in the bun even if they easily reached it.

The girl smoothed her sand-colored turtle-neck shirt and clipped a light armor-vest over it. It was very durable armor that was lighter than most and also quite form-fitting, making it easier to move with it. Nothing like those bulky chuunin-vests in any country. It had cost a lot but worth it. Kairi had been saving money for years for it so she could buy one when she was over her growth spurt. She wasn’t as tall as she used to be but 163 cm was perfectly respectable height in this world for females.

Looking at herself in the mirror, the girl noted amusedly that what she was wearing was similar to what Minato-ji, Aburame Shibi and Akimichi Chouza wore in Naruto Shippuuden movie Lost Tower in in different color. It was a good movie though. And their outfits were good too.

Kairi attached her kunai holster on her right thigh over her fitting dark grey pants and secured her medium sized fan on her back. It was nowhere near as big as Temari’s but assisted Kairi with her Fuuton just fine. Next to her fan, Kairi lifted her one-strap backpack on. It had just enough supplies for a couple of days of travel and a bit over a two week of stay in Konoha. If she even made it to the second phase.

Honestly, she didn’t have much confidence in her current teammates. It was their second exams, having failed in the previous ones and then during the six months in-between lost their third teammate on a mission. So Kairi had been called in to _substitute_. The jounins and Yondaime Kazekage didn’t believe she could get promoted anymore. But as she was free-floating between teams, they’d put her in the team roster again. And the other two… Frankly, Hara and Souseki were both idiots. Brutes, and idiots.

“Joy…”

* * *

Kairi ate the breakfast with her mother, Akane. It was a quiet affair, both of them enjoying the meal and each other’s presence.

“Ready?” Akane asked, getting up and clearing the table.

“As always.” The fifteen-year-old girl returned wryly. “Wish me luck.”

“I will. Do your best. Maybe this time you get to the finals.” The woman smiled, hopefully but sadly. “I know you could do it.”

There wasn’t much features that Kairi had inherited from her mother aside from her height. Her coloring, shape of eyes… It all came from her father, only emphasized by the similar conditions in life. Desert sun tanned them both to similar degree and bleached their naturally blonde hair even lighter. They had the same green eyes that shared the shape with other Namikaze brothers. Reika was the other one to have the same eyes but she got different shade of green from her mother. Arashi and Minato both had blue eyes, color that Naruto (and Deidara) had too even if the fox-boy got Uzumaki Kushina’s face and eye shape.

Confusing? Maybe, but in the end it didn’t matter. It was only within their family that any connections were made. Sandaime Tsuchikage might have known and remembered but as Yondaime Hokage was dead, he didn’t care either. And Naruto’s parentage was naturally a secret that only Kairi knew. Kaito knew there was a wife and a son but didn’t know their names.

How did he know even that much?

Because the Namikaze family had a… ‘magical’ book. It recorded their family member according to chakra signature even if Kishi and Shizue had been civilians. Kairi didn’t know how to book worked but she guessed it had some sort of link with seals to nature chakra through which it detected when a new person linked to the previous chakra signatures was born and when people’s signatures died. And through the child was also a link to the spouse too. Or a lover. Then it was up to the family to fill the blanks in the book.

That book had been carried from Ishi by Kaito. He had wanted to have at least some sort of connection to his family even when he lost sight of them.

Through that book he saw when his mother died. When his father died. When his youngest brother died soon after his son was born. And of course when the son’s mother died too. That’s when he decided to get in contact with his remaining brother and his family.

And now Kairi had the book. She filled in the blanks and hid the book away. It was better if no one got their hands on it.

* * *

Kairi headed bid goodbye for her mother and headed for the village gates. She was nervous. Not about the exams but about the fact that she was about to travel four days with Suna’s jinchuuriki Gaara in the same company.

She wasn’t scared exactly. But she still knew the power he wielded and didn’t wield. And she knew he saw her as nothing but an ant. Or even less. Expendable anyways just like the rest of the citizens of Suna.

And it wasn’t only in the jinchuuriki’s eyes. The grueling schooling in Suna had made sure that Kairi understood it. Suna was no Konoha that valued teamwork and the Will of Fire idealism passed down from the first Hokage and his successors.

In a way, Kairi wished that Suna was more like how Konoha was depicted. But in other way, she was glad that she didn’t need to interact with canon characters. Besides, Suna’s Shinobi School prepared for desert conditions, poisonous and venomous animals and plants, and survival in general in area where villages were few and far in between. Water they did have, running in underground rivers but other resources were sometimes hard to find. And with the Wind Daimyo and other nobles giving missions to Konoha, money was running low too. Thus aggression was directed towards Konoha and Kazekage was preparing for war. Kairi knew all that. She’d been debriefed when been given her current team. It probably should’ve flattered her that she was chosen to go and have a shot to get a slot in the tournament but really… She was just tired.

“It doesn’t matter…” Kairi muttered when approaching the gates. “My sense of self-preservation is greater than my loyalty to the village. If needed, I’ll run to Iwa. Arashi-ji and Reika-nee will surely welcome me.”

“Ah, Kairi-chan, finally here!” A cheery voice said. It was her temporary jounin sensei Natsuhiko. Close-range specialist with wind affinity, deadly with any sharp weapon given to him. Well, being a shinobi and a jounin, deadly was given… But he was Kairi’s favourite thus far. The team mates, not so much.

“What took so long?” Hara Jyari sneered at her. Kairi glared back coldly.

“It’s seven in the morning on dot. I’m exactly on time, Hara.” The girl replied.

“It’s Hara _-san_ for you, loser.” The boy replied. He was shorter than Kairi and younger too. And more arrogant. And tried to make Kairi to feel inferior.

“Jyari-kun, please don’t start now.” Souseki spoke up. He wasn’t as bad as Hara but annoying still. “I don’t want to hear you babbling this early…”

Before Hara could snipe at either of them, the leader of their convoy – and the jounin-sensei of team 1 – Baki gathered their attention.

“Alright everybody! Like you all know, the sun is rising! We intend to cross the desert before it reaches the zenith!”

That mean approximately five hours before the sun became scorching. Thankfully the desert didn’t start right at the border but several kilometers after(or before depending on where you were coming from). It meant pushing them all a bit but Kairi wasn’t worried, she’d timed herself to get across the desert in three and half hours when augmenting herself with chakra and not having to worry about the desert sun. It was when she’d been coming back from a mission with Natsuhiko-sensei early in morning.

“Allowed to progress on your own speed but we will gather together at outpost five!” Baki continued. Everyone knew outpost five. It was the outpost everyone signed up at when coming from Hi no Kuni before starting to cross desert. In the case people in Suna didn’t hear about you in a week after signing up, they sent a search party. Naturally foreign shinobi avoided it if they didn’t have an escort mission. It was the same situation with outpost three at Kaze-Tsuchi border and outpost four near Ame. Outposts 1-2 and 6-onwards were for border guard. Those were the ones that were attacked during war times.

“Permission to proceed, sensei?” Kairi asked. Natsuhiko glanced at the two boys of their group before nodding.

“Permission granted. Hara-kun, Souseki-kun, you stick with me.” The jounin said. He knew that the boys couldn’t keep up with the girl. And it was good to give Kairi some space before the exams. She was aggravated enough with having to take it again.

“But sensei!” Hara protested immediately. “Why does she get to go on her own?”

“Because she knows her limits when crossing desert. I heard that you and Souseki-kun both almost passed out in the desert because you forgot to hydrate yourself. Makoto-kun had to carry you both to Suna. Feat which I’d like to remind you to have cost his life.”

“I understand.” Souseki nodded while Hara scoffed. It was clear that Souseki had cared for their previous third teammate much more than Hara had. Pity that Makoto had died. Kairi had heard that he had been a nice boy…

Not that it mattered anymore. Dead was dead and nothing was bringing them back. (Except Orochimaru but even that was only temporary.)

Kairi touched her bun and made sure her hair sticks were secured before breaking into a run. Cool and dry desert air was washing over her skin while the first rays of sun were slowly peeking over the horizon. It was a great day and she would not let anyone to ruin it for her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arriving to Konoha and a glimpse of irregularity.

**As the sea calls 3  
Thumbelina**

“Three hours and twenty minutes… I got better.” Kairi mused. While the subtraction might’ve been big – whole ten minutes – the distance was also great and thus while keeping up a steady pace, the seconds and minutes she managed to nip off per kilometer accumulated together. That, and Kairi had been training hard both with weights and without chakra. Though not both at the same time. The point was though that she was the first at outpost five.

The outpost was situated in a tower right at the edge of desert. It was manned by three people at time, mostly for social purposes. The chuunin in that particular outpost didn’t do much patrolling, just kept contact with Suna about people coming and going.

The instructions were to wait for the main group so after stretching a bit, Kairi drank a bit water and sat down into the shadow of the tower to wait. They’d probably sign-out all together.

“You know… One would think that you are lying in wait here to ambush us and get the logs.” An amused voice spoke from above her. Kairi looked up tiredly at the open window that had someone poking their head out.

“…Koto-kun. How’s it going?” The girl asked with a faint smile. Koto had been originally in the same genin team with her and gained promotion three years ago.

“Just fine.” The teen shrugged and after a moment of consideration, he jumped out of the window, landing neatly in front of Kairi. “So… Konoha then?”

“Yeah. I’m getting a full set by now.” The year they’d graduated the first chuunin exam available had been in Konoha too but their jounin-sensei hadn’t recommended them to participate yet. In the next ones in Kumo they’d been properly stomped to ground in the second phase.

“You know… Out of all genin participating from Suna, I think you have the best chances when it comes to terrain. You’ve been running so many missions outside Kaze no Kuni and participated to exams that you should have easy time by now in adjusting and adapting.”

“Thank you for the vote of confidence. But this is not only about me. We are going to Konoha where teamwork is valued more than in other countries. While I could get through all the phases on my own and qualify to the finals, if my teammates drag me down, it doesn’t matter in the end.” The girl shrugged. Koto didn’t look at her in pity but with a hint of sadness.

“You used to be so full of faith even after we failed for the first time.” He stated.

“After that my father died just before the next exams. Excuse me for mourning him even while in exams.” Kairi snapped. Koto raised his hands in mock-surrender.

“I know, I know… And I’m still grateful for you to getting Yomi and I through the two first phases even though you forfeited right after that.”

It was true. All of her mishaps hadn’t been only because of poor teammates or too difficult test. In the beginning she’d had two wonderful teammates but she had been weak herself.

“At the rate I’m going now, that exam was probably the only one where I had an actual chance in getting promoted. I don’t get why Kazekage-sama keeps pushing me to these things. These are for publicity as much as for promotion. Why put a failure such as I-…?”

“Stop right there, Kairi-chan.” Koto glared at her. “You are not a failure. You are a chuunin level ninja already. I don’t know what sort of politics there are going on that prevents you from getting a field promotion but you can’t let this get to you.”

“Otou-san said that Sandaime Kazekage was the one to degree it when sealing our family name behind red tape and classifications. Yondaime probably could overturn the decision but as far as I know, he isn’t even aware that such degree exists.” Kairi didn’t know the real reason but she could guess it had something to do with second war tensions and later Minato-ji’s infamy on battlefield. If a member of Namikaze family was to be promoted, it would be on public arena as a show of talent and power. And as chuunin she could claim her family name finally.

But that was just speculation about obscure politics. Kairi could live even without the name. It didn’t matter that much to her…

“Okay…” The boy next to her nodded slowly and looked up to the horizon then. “It looks like the next part of your group is arriving. I think I’ll go to get the log book now.”

“…Alright.” Kairi gave a small wave to her ex-team member who simply jumped up to the window. With a sigh, the girl got on her feet and turned to face the desert where the next part of their contingency was arriving. She wasn’t surprised to see Team 1 at the head of it.

* * *

Seven out of ten teams participating and their jounin-senseis were at the tower now. Koto and his colleague were putting down the names as more people arrived. The rest of Kairi’s team came with the last two teams.

They were ordered to gather with their jounin-sensei and then they’d start their trek towards Konoha. It would take a couple of days since they’d be resting the nights. It made sense since they all were on different levels even if there was no rookies in their group. Gaara was the youngest but he was… well, Gaara.

Kairi resigned herself to listen Hara and Souseki for the next few days. The run through the desert had been enjoyable especially when the two took so long (or had Natsuhiko been holding them back so she could rest longer?), but now she’d have to be with them for the next two weeks at least.

Kairi bid goodbye to Koto and sidled up next to Natsuhiko then. The man smiled at the girl when the group began moving.

“Had a good run?”

“Very enjoyable.” The girl nodded. “I broke my record by ten minutes.”

“Well, there you go. You might have to slow down for you teammates though when the actual exam takes a place.”

“I know… But what I’ve seen from previous exams, the survival part is in the second phase. First I need to get through the first phase. And with those two…” She sighed.

“What do you mean by that?!” Hara snarled immediately.

“Oh, other than the obvious Mr.-I-didn’t-get-through-the-first-phase?” Kairi deadpanned.

“Jyari-kun. Please shut up.” Souseki sighed.

“Getting high and mighty there, aren’t you!?” Hara continued like his ‘friend’ hadn’t spoken. “You are the one to have failed, what? Four times already and yet you act so though.”

“Well, I’ve always gotten to the second phase at least and once almost to the finals. It was only in Kiri where people cut down brutally the participants that no one from Suna got through the first phase.” Kairi glared. “Statistics are nothing when compared to the real thing.”

Hara harrumphed and turned away, speeding up his steps. Souseki followed after him. Natsuhiko sighed.

“Why was I saddled with this team again?” He asked running a hand through his sand-colored locks and accidentally crooking his forehead protector. The jounin straightened it immediately and tightened the knot at the back of his head.

“Because you and I had been doing missions together and the boys needed a team? And their jounin-sensei gladly gave them to you?” Kairi shrugged.

“These are going to be long four days, aren’t they?” The man asked.

“I feel your pain, I really do.”

“Your sarcasm is noted and appreciated.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

The journey was spent with occasional chatter but mostly in silence. The group proceeded with easy run as they were in no hurry. During evenings they stopped to camp. Twice in an inn and once in the forest. Kairi regularly challenged people in a game of poker or blackjack, easily winning most of them until she was delegated into the dealer.

“They are your decks so of course you are cheating.” Natsuhiko explained.

“Sensei, how rude! I have only one cheat-deck and that is for my sleight of hand tricks.” Kairi gasped.

“With the way you’ve been scamming even jounin here, I beg to differ.” Came the retort accompanied by a couple of chuckles.

“Fine, see if I deal any good cards for you!”

* * *

In the Sunday morning they finally arrived to Konoha. The exams would begin on the following Saturday at the Ninja Academy.

The passports and the visa were inspected before they were let into the village. There were some genin corps members that were showing way to the hotels that were booked for the foreign teams to stay in. That made it easier for the local population to keep an eye on them. Kairi couldn’t help but wonder if some Konohan spies had caught wind of the whispers of war. To her knowledge the information was limited only to top jounin, chuunin and a few of the participating genins.

The girl looked up at Natsuhiko. Given the way he was glancing subtly about to memorize the civilian areas from shinobi ones, he most likely knew about the invasion already. The entire Team 1 knew too. Kairi could see that the tension on Temari’s and Kankuro’s shoulders wasn’t just because of Gaara’s presence. Last time she’d see something like that had been in chuunin exams in Kumo briefly before two Kiri teams attacked Iwa teams. All of them had been disqualified as not even the first phase had started.

Kairi sighed, regardless of what her progress in these exams was, there would be difficult few weeks ahead of her. In the meanwhile, she’d better take the opportunity to sightsee in in this village hidden among leaves.

* * *

They signed up to the hotel and deal the rooms for pairs. The genin boys were mainly paired based on their teams and girls then shuffled and paired together. Not so surprisingly, Kairi shared the room with Temari.

“You going to take a look around?” Kairi asked when they sort through their belongings and see what they could leave to the room and what they should keep with them. She wasn’t particularly close with the girl despite them having been on the same class in the academy. Kairi had taken her chance to graduate a year earlier to get out of that stifling madhouse full of kids more or less immature, cruel and plain annoying.

“Yes, uh…” The Kazekage’s daughter floundered a bit. She didn’t remember Kairi’s name. And the girl didn’t offer it either.

“Me too. Given my history, I simply can’t pass up this chance to see the fifth but first one of the five great ninja villages.” Aside from card games, Kairi loved architecture and history. She had studied them both in her previous life. She remembered those lessons even if she didn’t remember her teachers or classmates.

“I see…” Temari said but scowled then. “You are the one with failure after failure in her exam record, right? What are you doing here then anymore?”

“Ah, excellent question.” Kairi smiled. “Maybe they need my skills next month regardless of how I do here.”

Because despite Kairi’s abysmal exam record, she was no genin anymore. People knew it even when they tried to bring her down. With a flippant wave, the blonde turned to leave the room, her other hand once again checking her hair sticks. They were still tightly tucked into the bun and this time Kairi had even managed to twist her side locks into the mess too.

“I see.” Temari nodded. So she was aware of the invasion already. Good to have a confirmation.

* * *

Konoha was… Konoha was an experience. Even though Kairi was innately aware that she was wearing the hitai-ate of a rival village, she felt more or less welcomed. People were warm and greeting her when she bought some snack or asked for directions. The amount of gossip floating around was crazy but it wasn’t anything terribly secret to be hidden. Just mindless gossip even if it was about the shinobi in the village. Now that foreigners were in too and still coming, there provided yet another source for rumors.

Kairi looked up at the four stone-faces of Hokage Mountain.

 _“Hello, Minato-jisan…”_ She thought with a faint smile before turning away. _“Pity I never got to know you like Arashi-jisan.”_

Maybe she could visit the memorial stone someday before the exams itself began. Not today thought. Today was for relaxing strolling and familiarizing herself with the areas allowed for the foreign shinobi to use. As a preparation for the influx of visitors there was an occasional map in a street corner to show that for example clan compounds and majority of civilian residential areas were off-limits. One might wonder what Konoha was providing foreigners with a map of their village but… They were optimist tree-huggers. And Konoha’s structure was pretty clear-cut anyways according to the map. Clan compounds were hard to miss anyways and public functions like Academy, Hospital and Hokage Tower were easy to find even without the map. And those three were big targets anyways during invasions. Civilians… their quarters were marked off-limits for courtesy’s sake.

While wandering around, there wasn’t much familiar(canon) faces to see. Some headbands but mostly civilians. Kairi stuck out like a sore thumb with her tan, and fan, and Sunan attire but it didn’t bother her. It was routine for her already.

* * *

Eventually Kairi got tired to just go aimlessly around the merchant street and decided to go check where exactly was the Academy so she could find her way there quickly on Saturday. The girl turned around and headed approximately towards the Hokage Mountain. She might’ve taken a detour on the way but who was there to judge her? No one.

Children’s laughter, old wives’ gossip, smell of food and leaves. And…

“Shinobi-san, you are from the Village Hidden in Sand, correct? What is your reason for being in Konoha?” A young voice of a girl asked behind a corner. Kairi slowed her steps a bit. That was quite young voice, probably a genin. Huh, maybe one of the competitor she’d face… Who was she confronting though?

“We’re here for the Chuunin Exams.” It was Temari who answered. Of course it was. This was probably the incident were Konohamaru had run into Kankuro. But the voice of the girl speaking previously didn’t sound like Sakura’s from anime. So who was it then?

Suppressing her chakra to minimum, Kairi stepped into the street and took a look at the group there. She wanted a chance to observe them all before garnering their attention. Temari, Kankuro… Gaara in the nearby tree. Three Konohan shinobi… ninja. Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke and… an unknown girl. Plus Konohamaru corps.

The unknown girl was the one that had addressed Temari and asked for the passport like protocol in every major village required. Kairi remembered asking for passport just a week before leaving Suna from a pair of Taki shinobi. The Konohan girl had long brown hair braided down her back and was wearing comfortable looking shinobi attire. Easy to move in yet very… genin. Probably recently graduated given her height and the fact she hadn’t invested in armor yet. And given the current company probably even replacement of Haruno Sakura. With the symbol of Nara Clan in her jacket, it was quite plausible theory.

“I see.” The Nara girl said. “May I remind you that the streets are regarded as civilian areas and that violence is prohibited in these locations? If you are wishing to train, I’m sure there are several designated training sites allocated for you.”

Both Kankuro and Sasuke tensed, like ready to fight each other anyways. While Kairi had never had any need to interact with the puppet user, she had heard of his temper when the boy was in the academy.

“Kankuro…” That was Gaara. “You are a disgrace to our village.” The twelve-year-old was hanging upside down from the branch of the tree. ‘Just chilling’ one could say if they knew nothing about the red-head. Kairi’s interractions with the boy were zero. She only knew about him through howling wind and Shukaku’s rage. Of whispers in the streets and her mother sighing while going through yet another report about an assassination attempt failing. Not that she ever told Kairi what they were actually about.

No wait… There was one time when Kairi was eight or nine. When her memories of this world – her archive – weren’t that clear yet. She had met with a boy with red hair and a poncho wrapped around him. Large, large teal eyes looking at her innocently. And when she offered and hand to shake, she got her ulna and radius bones in her right arm broken by the sand shooting at her. The pain had made the girl to pass out and when she woke, Kairi found herself in Sunagakure’s hospital with her mother next to her. And Kairi hadn’t had a clear image of what had happened to her. But she did go her way to avoid the boy ever since.

“Gaara…” Kankuro addressed his little brother, also snapping Kairi out of her sudden flashback. Konohamaru was on his feet now and not a feet in the air. The boy hid behind Naruto after casting a wary glance at Kairi.

“Have you forgotten the reason we came here?” The jinchuuriki asked.

“I… I know. They challenged us. See, here’s what happened-…” A sucky excuse and the slight tremble in Kankuro’s voice didn’t make it any more convincing.

“Shut up. Or I’ll kill you.” What a change it was from those wide innocent eyes to those filled with apathy and hate. But Gaara wasn’t Kairi’s problem to fix. No, that was for the protagonist to handle. Even with the presence of the mysterious Nara girl instead of Sakura, Kairi was certain that the main building blocks of that world were still in place. Naruto could sympathize with a fellow jinchuuriki but still set himself apart from him. To use the ‘Talk no Jutsu’… Hopefully.

“R-Right. I was out of line. Sorry, Gaara. I was totally out of line.” Kankuro backed down.

“I’m sorry for any trouble he caused.” Gaara said then to the Konoha genin.

“It was just a misunderstanding. It was nice to meet you.” The Nara girl bowed. It was interesting. She was tense, like she knew something was amiss. Like she knew something about Gaara. Maybe she was a sensor type. The Killing Intent radiating from the boy was subtle enough currently that mere genin wouldn’t have sensed it. Kairi wasn’t exactly a sensor but she was still familiar enough with Gaara’s chakra by now. The three days of travelling had been aggravating not only because of Hara and Souseki but also because of the tension that everyone had because of Gaara’s presence and the constant feel of the potential of being killed. It wasn’t nice. And during evenings it was worse when they settled down to sleep but only the jinchuuriki was awake with a couple of jounin who were on watch.

Gaara appeared on the ground with sand-assisted Body Flicker. “Let’s go. We didn’t come here to play games. You too, Kairi.”

He knew her name? Or remembered? It was fuzzy, had she introduced herself to the boy back then? Or was there some other reason that he knew?

_“My name is Kairi. Nice to meet you Gaara-chan!”_

“Ah, sure.” Kairi replied with a smile, pushing away the questions for now and enjoying the way the three genin and the three academy students tensed. Hmm, was she wrong about the Nara girl being a sensor if she didn’t notice Kairi? Or was Kairi when suppressing her chakra so small of a target that with Gaara nearby, she vanished from the radar? Interesting.

The girl walked past the three locals and joined the Sand Siblings aka Team 1. She glanced at the Konohan Team 7. Naruto and Sasuke looked like about the same than she’d expected, even if the conversation here hadn’t gone like scripted. Naruto didn’t get Temari to explain about the chuunin exams, meaning that he probably knew at least somewhat about them. So someone was watching after him and keeping him somewhat updated. And Sasuke hadn’t asked for Gaara’s name (plus title). And if Kairi had read the situation correctly, Sasuke had been with the other five and not arrived at the last minute like in the original version of this story. Meaning that he was connecting with others.

Kairi let her mouth quirk a smile as she looked at the Nara girl. She was cute but quite ordinary. Probably had somewhat unimaginative name like ‘Shikako’ and… was possibly like Kairi.

 _“She is making waves already. This will promise to be interesting.”_ The teenager thought in amusement. It looked like the Nara girl was puzzling over Kairi’s presence too. She was also a deviation from canon after all.

“Omoshiroi…” Kairi hummed, walking after her fellow Suna Shinobi. She wasn’t sure where they were going now but Kairi had a feeling it had to do with the fact that Gaara knew her name. She wouldn’t pry though. She would keep her distance from the boy and not show her fear and not antagonize him either.

After all, her sense of self-preservation exceeded her loyalty to her village.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time runs fast in Konoha.

**As the sea calls 4  
**

The four of them made their way back to the hotel in silence. Once there, they met up with Baki and Natsuhiko who led them to one of the rooms.

“Natsuhiko-sensei, Baki-sensei, what is going on? Why…” Kairi began but cut herself short. She had questions but she wasn’t sure what security measures had been implemented in this room, if any yet. After all for all intents and purposes they all were in an enemy territory now.

“You got a mission, Kairi.” Natsuhiko said.

“Yes?”

“You have a job to scout Konoha’s environment and find any and all geographical information you can.” Baki spoke up. “Once the day is here, you will be delivering messages between troops so you’ll need good knowledge on the terrain and routes. You four will be working closely together.”

Temari and Kankuro straightened at that. Well, that certainly explained why Kairi was rooming with the other girl.

“I was chosen because of my speed, wasn’t I?” Kairi looked at her team leader who suddenly looked sheepish.

“I might’ve mentioned your desert crossing record to other jounins.” Natsuhiko grimaced apologetically. “This is also why I let you show off when we were coming here. You are the fastest genin we have and even if you won’t make it to the finals, your presence won’t raise suspicions until the… start.” The jounin glanced at Gaara but looked away then.

“Gaara.” Baki turned to address the jinchuuriki. “You will not kill Kairi-san at any point during the exams or between the first phases and finals. Am I understood?”

“Yes…” The red head said. Kairi glanced at the boy and couldn’t help but sigh internally in relief. While there was no guarantee that Gaara would follow the order, it still… It was still a relief of sorts to hear the order and the boy’s affirmative reply.

“You are one of our best, Kairi-san. Do not disappoint us.” Baki said, snapping the girl back to attention.

“I understand, Baki-sensei.” She nodded. While dangerous assignment, it also meant that she was not required to fight unless necessary. No one would fault her if she went hiding instead of attacking head first Konoha forces. “Am I dismissed? I need to start planning how to go on about my mission.”

“Yes. You may go.”

Kairi turned on her heels and marched out of the room. She had an idea how to find out more about Konoha’s terrain and also how to increase her speed. And in the end she only needed to stick to her routine.

* * *

At five-fifteen next morning, a slim figure slipped out of the hotel housing the Suna shinobi and made her way towards the local Administration center. Like in Suna, it housed Mission desk, Jounin Stand-by Station, Chuunin Lounge and Check-in Desk for shinobi – ninja, she was in Konoha now so they were commonly called ninja here – coming back from sick-leave or holiday.

And as she had assumed, the place was already bustling with activity. Or rather, it continued throughout the night. Considering the irregular and unpredictable times when ninja came back from missions, the desks were always manned. And at least in Suna Jounin Stand-by station about always had at least couple of people either playing board or card games, reading or gossiping. Not everyone appreciated the quietness of their own apartments during night.

“Ah, excuse me…” Kairi bowed slightly at the waist when peeking in. “I’m used to running in the mornings but since I’m from Suna, I don’t know the possibilities here… Could you please tell me which training ground has the longest circumference?”

Some of the ninja at the Mission Desk flicked their eyes at her hitai-ate, now tied around her bicep rather than forehead, before returning to their jobs. By the staircase a pair of Tokubetsu-jounin exchanged a glance before one of them approached her nonchalantly.

“You’re here for the chuunin exams, right?” The man asked. Kairi recognized him. Bandana-style hitai-ate, chin-length brown hair, senbon in his mouth, lopsided smile and disinterested eyes… Shiranui Genma.

“Yes, Shinobi-san. But there is still a couple of days before they start so I want to train the best I can before it.” The girl smiled. There was one other reason why Kairi had been chosen to her mission. While fast, she also had the best chances in acquiring information boldly but without rousing suspicion. She was perfect infiltrator because she was so genuine and kind.

Creepily enough, those qualities accompanied with her exam record, reminded her of Kabuto.

“Hmm… A friend of mine likes to train early too. Goes on long runs.” Genma began and Kairi… had an inkling as to whom he was speaking about. And with the glint in TokuJo’s eyes, she assumed it was to ‘mess with the foreigner’s head’. “He likes to run along the wall surrounding Konoha. As you are from another village I can’t let you do that alone but as he is a jounin…”

“If a jounin is accompanying me, he can keep an eye on me so I don’t stray to restricted areas.” Kairi nodded. “I understand. Am I to assume that some of the clan compounds are close to the wall then?”

“Ah, ah… Don’t try fishing information from me…” Genma narrowed his eyes but his mouth quirked a smile. The girl laughed.

“Shinobi are sly and have to get any information they can, whenever they can.” She grinned. “My apologies though. Next time I won’t be so sloppy in my questioning.”

Genma returns the grin, intrigued. If Kairi were to guess, there probably wasn’t much foreign shinobi to engage in banter like this so easily. A genin even less so.

“You are a strange girl. But come along, if I remember correctly, Gai should be by his usual training ground by now. It’s his starting point.” He waved her to follow him, much to the amusement of the other ninja assembled. No one commented on it though. They’d wait for the news of her reaction later. For gossip.

* * *

The training ground was a flat ground with occasional speck of grass and surrounded by trees. Wooden posts meant for hitting and kicking were in the tree line and the area opened to the direction of the wall. When Genma and Kairi arrived, Maito Gai was already there, doing warm-ups.

“Genma! My youthful friend! What brings you here this morning?” The spandex-clad man greeted his former genin teammate. “Are you going to join me with my morning practice?”

“Ah no thank you, Gai. I need to get back to Stand-by Station. Last minute preparations, you know.” Genma declined the offer. “But I have someone with me who’d like to run the longest track Konoha has to offer…”

Kairi took that as a sign to step forward. She carefully kept her face polite. Gai was… an experience. The green spandex alone was strange, let alone his mannerisms. But he was a good guy and Kairi didn’t want to offend or insult the man. After all he was a jounin and Kairi was a stranger. And future enemy.

“My name is Kairi, and I’m from Suna for the exams. Umm… Genma-san told me that you also go on the morning runs so…” The girl floundered. “I’d be grateful if…”

“If you’d keep an eye on her while showing the route.” Genma concluded, clapping a hand on her shoulder.

“Of course! I’d be honored to show the way to such a youthful young woman who has come here all the way from the Village Hidden in Sand!” Gai beamed. “We just wait for my youthful student Lee and then we can get going!”

The jounin returned to his warm-ups and Kairi glanced up, bewildered, at Genma who grinned at her.

“Well?” The TokuJo asked.

“I… I knew that shinobi are strange and jounin even more so and that Konohagakure no Sato’s shinobi are by reputation the strangest of them all but…” Kairi began but shut her mouth then. The man chuckled.

“You are not wrong.”

* * *

At five-thirty another spandex-clad figure bounded to the training ground. Rock Lee was only slightly shorter than Kairi and two years younger. And the girl was thankful that she hadn’t been left alone with Gai while waiting. But once Lee was there, Genma patted her shoulder and wished her luck before leaving.

The girl took a deep breath, listened as Gai boisterously introduced her and Lee to each other, and prepared to her run. While waiting she’d been doing her warm ups and stretches while talking with Genma about anything and everything menial. The gap made by their different villages hindered the conversation a bit but was otherwise amicable. The TokuJo was waiting for her to express more of a reaction to Gai than slight weirded-outness. He didn’t get the satisfaction of seeing it.

“How much is the circumference of the wall?” Kairi asked the two taijutsu experts. “I’m timing myself and comparing my time on later tries.”

“Almost 200 kilometers! Right, Gai-sensei?” Lee answered.

“That’s right, Lee! Most youthful distance for morning runs!” Gai announced.

“Gai-sensei!”

“Lee!”

“Gai-sensei!”

“Lee!”

 _“Right…”_ Kairi sweat-dropped before clearing her throat. “Umm… Gai-san, Lee-kun, shall we go?”

Two-hundred kilometers was nothing. Longer than Kairi’s usual runs but this wasn’t on desert. No gripping coldness of night nor scorching hotness of day. She could do this. Especially when she didn’t need to use chakra to stay steady on the sand. With her current speed she could probably fit the run into an hour.

“One round on moderate pace since we have Kairi-san here with us.” Gai announced. “She doesn’t know this route yet.”

That was… nice.

Kairi dug her pouch for her stop watch and reset it.

“Ready?” Gai asked. All three of them prepared along an invisible line.

“Set.” Kairi pressed her finger ready on the stopwatch’s button.

“Go!” The trio shot off, Lee taking lead and Gai adjusting his speed with Kairi. The girl put her watch back to the pouch and kept running. Solid ground was always a novel experience after spending time in Suna and running in desert. And while Suna had solid training grounds alongside sand ones, it was the scenery outside Kaze no Kuni that made the difference. Reason why Kairi asked Natsuhiko-sensei to request out-of-country missions as much as possible eve if they were guarding merchants and some such.

And now, with the green and brown and so many other colors of Konoha, Kairi was greatly enjoying herself. Running was a mindless task that allowed her to sink into her own thoughts, into her own inner world. Here in Konoha, she couldn’t do that. Because of her mission and because there was just _so much to see_.

“Do you usually go on runs this early, Kairi-san?” Gai asked her after a while. “Not many that I know even wake up before dawn.”

“It’s a sort of necessity in Suna. While the nights are very cold in desert, the days’ hotness compensate for it more than enough. Mornings and evenings are the times when I got for my runs because the temperature is ideal then.” Kairi replied. “There is not that many people that I know either to go running regularly like I do but they might be using some different route too.” She shrugged and glanced up. They were going clockwise along the wall, currently headed towards the Hokage Mountain. But since Hokage Tower was right by the mountain did that mean they’d go over the mountain then? Maybe there was a path that they’d use. A break from monotony.

“Ah, I see. Are these your first chuunin exams then?” The jounin asked then. In front of them, Lee turned around and kept backwards.

“Gai-sensei nominated our team for the exams this year! I’m very excited for them.” The genin smiled and Kairi couldn’t help but smiling back.

“Ah, no… These are my fifth ones actually. I’ve had some bad luck on my previous exams.”

“Well maybe this time you will be luckier then!” Gai gave her thumbs up. Incredible how he – and Lee – was just so supportive despite her being from another village.

“Maybe.” Kairi nodded. _“Or maybe not…”_

* * *

They run over the Hokage Mountain and behind clan compounds. Through forests closer to wall and towards the training ground they used as starting point. Now it was a finish line. The trio speeded up and even Kairi pushed herself to go faster and faster.

They skidded to stop and Kairi quickly stops the time from her watch. An hour and seven minutes. Not bad in an unfamiliar terrain while taking it easy but… She could do much better. She wrote her time down on a small notebook she had in her pouch and drank a bit of water from the small bottle she had with her.

“Second round?” She asked the two males and received two eager grins.

* * *

It became another part of her routine. In the morning she’d meet with Gai and Lee at the training ground and they’d warm up, stretch and then run around Konoha. First taking it easy. Second as fast as they could (though Gai made sure that he didn’t lose Kairi from his field of vision). And the third time a mid-ground between the two. Kairi kept getting better times after every run as she got more familiar with the terrain and environment. She still avoided showing her true speed to the two Konoha-nin.

After the runs Hyuuga Neji and Tenten usually arrived and began their routine training. At that point Kairi usually left. After all she’d face the team in the exams but didn’t feel like it was right to spy on their fighting styles. And she didn’t want them to see her style either.

* * *

On Tuesday, Kairi accidentally found training ground three and its Memorial Stone. Thankfully it looked like Kakashi wasn’t there so she got a chance to get a look at the names on the stone. If not for any other reason than to get a back-up for the names she added to the Family Book.

And there… Right below Namikaze Minato, was Uzumaki Kushina’s name written on.

_“Kushina-ba… You never knew about Minato-ji’s family… but I wish I could’ve met you too. At least once.”_

The Suna-girl’s eyes strayed on the other names. Some she recognized. Some she didn’t. Some had tragedies behind them. Some were killed with the butterfly effect that were Kairi and Reika both.

Like Uchiha Obito.

In the original Naruto world Obito survived, thanks to Madara and Zetsu. In this world…

 _“I might not be as mad as my little brother but I went through war. And that had plenty of crazy to share everyone.”_ Reika had told Kairi when they met bit after her previous chuunin exams in Iwa. Kairi had failed in the second phase but stayed with her uncle and cousin to watch the finals.

_“I was ten. Newly promoted chuunin and part of explosion corps. They decided not to send me to the front lines were tou-chan was but in the middle of Kusa to guard this supply bridge.”_

_“Kannabi?”_ Kairi had asked, remembering Kakashi Gaiden.

_“Exactly. I was placed in a squad with Mahiru, Kakkoo and Taiseki. They were all jounin-level shinobi if I remember correctly. Either way we squatted there for weeks, a bit over month actually, occasionally scouting. Then one day Mahiru didn’t come back. Kakkoo and Taiseki went to investigate and came back to the base with a prisoner. A medical ninja only a few years older than I. Her name was Rin…”_

_“She was put into genjutsu.”_

_“Yeah. But she spoke nothing. Then we heard a sound like someone slapping something. Taiseki went to investigate… and didn’t come back.”_ Reika had sighed and blown bit of her hair away from her face. _“My orders were simple really. While guarding the bridge was the primary mission, I needed to stay alive. My bloodline was valuable for Iwagakure after all and I was young so I could do a lot in future. So when Taiseki didn’t return I went underground. There was a tunnelsystem in place for my escape. I’m a sensor so I know when Kakkoo was first taken down and then making the base collapse on the Konoha-nin. It was just like in Gaiden.”_

Reika was a reincarnate too. But she didn’t know the entire story. She had only read until a bit after Hidan and Kakuzu were killed but died in a car crash then. She knew nothing about fillers and finer details. Heck, she hadn’t even known that Yondaime Hokage was Naruto’s father until Kairi told her.

_“The reinforcements arrived and I made my way away from the base. And they began dying. One by one, faster than I could detect. I was scared so I did the only logical thing I could. I blew up my tunnels. It destabilized the ground and made the… Yellow Flash to retreat with his students. And I felt how the collapsing tunnels cave in under that Uchiha boy and let the stones crush him even more… Until his chakra flickered and died.”_

It was Reika’s first kill. It had shaken her and she had hidden underground for a long time until her father had come to get her like it had been agreed beforehand. Kairi pitied her cousin. She was glad that she hadn’t needed to fight a war like Reika had. And while Kairi had killed people, a lot of people thus far, she had been older by then and none of her targets had been children.

* * *

On Wednesday, Kairi found Ichiraku Ramen. She ate shoyu-ramen at Teuchi-san’s recommendation and promised to come again some other day. She also managed to avoid Naruto whilst visiting.

For her evening run, the girl asked Gai if it was okay to take her two summons with her. She had signed a contract around last new year’s and was still working with finding the correct pace with her summons.

“Sure!” The man had answered. Kairi bit the skin of her little fingers broken and smeared blood on both of her palms before going through the hand seals.

**Boar – Dog –Bird – Monkey – Ram**

“Kuchiyose no Jutsu!” The girl slammed both of her palms to the ground. In twin puffs of smoke, two desert foxes sat in front of her. They looked quite similar but had a bit differently shaded fur. And one had Sunagakure hitai-ate around her neck while other had it wrapped around her waist.

“Kai-chin!” The first one bounced on her summoner, pushing the girl to the ground.

“Kairi-chan!” The second one followed the first one, bouncing on the girl’s stomach.

“Uuf… Shirin, Shanna.” Kairi greeted the two. “You’ve both grown again.”

“That we have!” The two vixen said in unison before starting to bicker with each other. With a sigh, Kairi pushed them off her stomach, landing them in a heap. The two of them had been just small kits when she’d signed the contract but they’d grown fast. Now they were about the same size than normal foxes were.

“Ah, Gai-san, here are my two main summons Shirin and Shanna. They usually join on my runs. I thought a change of scenery would do them as much good as it has done to me.” Kairi got on her feet and gestured the two wrestling foxes. She didn’t mention that she wanted the two used to the smells and places already in the case she needed to summon them during the invasion. While they’d accompanied Kairi on some of ther missions on the past two months, big scale battle was much different and Kairi didn’t want the pair distracted by weird smells or overwhelmed by the change.

“Nice to meet you, Shinobi-san!” Shirin, the one with hitai-ate around neck and lighter sand-colored fur chirped when untangling herself from her sister.

“Yes, nice to meet you. Don’t mind the idiot.” Shanna, with more reddish tint in her fur and a bit more melodic voice, added.

“Hey, I’m not the idiot here!” Shirin growled and prepared to wrestle her sister to the ground again. Kairi sighed.

“Alright you two, we are running now. No fighting here please. If you behave I’ll get you amedama candy.”

“Really?!” The two vixen asked, neatly sitting down next to each other. Oh yes, bribing always worked with the two.

“Cactus flavored.” Kairi added and they were sold.

* * *

On Thursday, Kairi met up with Genma again. It was purely accidental to come across him in the market with Namiashi Raidou and Yamashiro Aoba. They were at a food stall to get some… was that gyoza?

“Ah, Kairi-san!” The TokuJo greeted the girl. She waved back and made her way to the trio.

“Genma-san. Nice to see you again.” She greeted the man.

“This is the girl from Hidden Sand who has been joining Gai on his runs?” Raidou asked with a hint of skepticism in his voice.

“And she hasn’t faltered yet.” Genma grinned at his friend.

“You tried to scare her away, didn’t you?” Aoba remarked.

“ _’She’_ is right here.” Kairi spoke up. “And it has been fun once I tune out the… most extreme behavior out. Change in surroundings have been nice too. Konoha is a beautiful place.”

“Konoha is the best.” Aoba nodded. “Good to hear that foreigners agree too.”

“Each of the villages have their own merits. I should know, having visited so many.” While there was two chuunin exams each year, only every other of them was in a one of the five major villages. And those exams were the ones that Kairi had been attending. Which was why the current ones were her fifth ones and not ninth or tenth ones. “But Suna is… home.”

“Naturally.” Raidou nodded, agreeing.

“You waiting eagerly for the exams to start then?” Genma asked.

“Yes. With my current team it’s going to be a bit hit-and-miss but… We’ll see how it goes. I really wish that I’d get my promotion finally.”

“Oh, exam veteran then?”

“Who’s fishing for information now?”

And they all laughed. Then Raidou happened to check the sun’s position.

“Genma, you can flirt foreign girls some other time. We need to get going back. The lunch break is almost over.”

“Oi, I wasn’t-….”

“You do realize that I’m barely sixteen and Genma-san is…” Kairi gave an assessing glance at the senbon user. “In his late twenties?” She got the age in her archive but couldn’t be bothered to dig it up and really, it wouldn’t have done any good for her in this situation.

“Sixteen? You look younger.” Aoba remarked. Kairi blinked. It was… somewhat true. At least as she was now. With her hitai-ate not shadowing her face and her hair styled on a braid rather than a bun, she did look younger. Not to mention that she had exchanged her armor to a light blue sleeveless hoodie. Little tricks and no need for henge. Smiling also helped to look younger.

Kairi was a kind and positive person generally. It was just that right before and after chuunin exams her mood soured and during the past months she’d been forced to train with Hara and Souseki so she had been frowning rather than smiling.

“My birthday is the twentieth of May. Big day too since the finals are then too.” Big day indeed. And if Kairi’s smile was a bit strained now, no one commented it.

“Ah, what a better birthday present than getting a promotion then.” Genma smiled. “But we should go now. Nice seeing you again, Kairi-san.”

“The same to you, Genma-san, shinobi-san, shinobi-san.”

“It’s Aoba and Raidou.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” She waved at the retreating backs and before turning around and eyeing the food stalls and restaurants in the area. The gyoza did look good but… “Tempura. I want tempura today.”

Yakiniku and yakitori were common in Suna along with insects and scorpions and what other desert creatures that could be caught and fried and grilled. The rest were usually imported. So whenever Kairi was out of village, she tried to find as many different dishes to taste as possible. In Iwa they had Chinese inspired food. In Kumo it was closer to American mixed culture though with a healthy dose of Asian cuisine. In Kiri it was Thai food while in Konoha it was Japanese.

It was another quirk and interest of hers other than poker, running and architecture.

* * *

On Friday Kairi noted with satisfaction that she’d gotten the tiniest bit faster during the week. She had also managed to craft an approximate map of the area and distances with the help of the ‘tourist map’ and her own observation and exploring. While not fan of math, the girl could quite well calculate distances and areas in her head based on her speed. She passed the map to Temari who gave it to Baki who then send it back to Suna somehow.

And Kairi… She didn’t feel bad exactly. Yes, she didn’t like deceiving her acquaintances she’d made in Konoha but she still had to play her part. Besides… being the offenders or not, many of the shinobi going to participate to the invasion were her friends. Natsuhiko-sensei, Koto and Yomi… Hayoi-san from a year above her in the academy. Kanata-san from Puppet Corps. Amara-san the poison expert from the hospital.

They were all her friends and she wanted to ensure that they all survived. At least somehow.

“Otou-san… What would you do?”

* * *

On Saturday, Kairi went on her last run. Back at the hotel she took a long shower and packed her gear. She wasn’t sure if the second phase would be directly after the first one of the day after but she didn’t want to take the risk of going unprepared. She donned her usual mission outfit and braided her hair once again but this time twisted it on a bun and stuck her hair sticks into it. Her side locks swayed slightly this time let out of the bun by her own choice. Kairi tied her hitai-ate on her forehead once again and looked in the mirror. She looked older. More prepared. And while the invasion was a month away, didn’t the Hokage say in his speech that the chuunin exams were equivalent of war?

“I’m ready.” She told her mirror-image and left the hotel room. She had her application form in her pocket, given to her by Natsuhiko on the previous day. It practically burned in her pocket and she itched to give it out already.

 _Fuukatsu Kairi_ , read in the form. It was her mother’s family name. While not uncommon in Suna to have no last names, they were still a village composed of originally nomadic shinobi families. Names mattered even if they didn’t have as much weight as clans of Konoha and Iwa and Kiri had. And until Kairi was a chuunin, she went officially by her mother’s name.

It was ironic really. And funny coincidence.

All three cousins went by the names of their mothers. All for the sake of secrecy.

Fuukatsu. Shiroishi. Uzumaki.

Even when the third link was concealed and unaware, the three of them were going to be great.

Everyone was causing ripples after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reika will appear only occasionally. She is Iwa jounin currently thus she is tied to her village. I'm not sure if I'll give her a genin team to look after though...
> 
> About Obito being honestly killed in here, it's mainly because of the plot situation of Dreaming of Sunshine which began before that particular plottwist, thus Madara is the big bad. Sorry, any Obito fans. I like him too but he won't be appearing in this fic.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First phase, commence!

**As the Sea calls 5**   
  


Kairi met her jounin-sensei and teammates in front of Konoha’s Ninja Academy.

“Good luck, all three of you.” Natsuhiko told them before leaving to join the other jounin at wherever they convened. He did whisper yet another ‘order’ for the girl to know. Kairi didn’t react to it and just gave a look at Hara and Souseki. This would be trial.

“Let’s go then. Floor three, room 301.” She gestured them to follow. And to her astonishment they did it with minimal grumbling. While Hara was usually very vocal in his protests about anything that Kairi did and Souseki was a prissy bastard sniffing disdainfully at both of them, apparently Natsuhiko managed to beat some sense into them during the past week.

The Academy was a real maze. It served a tactical purpose and gave an edge for Konoha-nin but was also the first obstacle, even if not an official one. It took a moment to find stairs that led directly to the second floor and not a floor in between the two at some other part of the academy. It took a moment more to find the only corridor that led to stairs to the third floor. And there was a genjutsu around the doorway about the middle of it. Considering the amount of stairs, it was easy to confuse genin from any village with that genjutsu.

The most current problem was the genin blocking the corridor.

“Alright. Can you henge into something that can easy slip past everyone? We’ll see at the stairs beyond the corridor.” Kairi asked the boys. Hara paused thoughtfully while Souseki grinned before flashing through the handseals.

With a mild puff of smoke, a gopher snake was in his place and slithered towards the sea of legs. There was surprised shouts but it looked like no one tried to kill the boy. Hara went next, as a gecko along the wall over the doorway.

“Ho? They can actually be sneaky then.” Kairi mused but forwent subtlety. She transformed into Shanna and raced towards the other genin, most of them surprisingly from Konoha. She jumped up, landed on the head of the closest one and then leaped at the next head. And next. And next. All the way to the other side of the crowd. People let out cries in surprise and slight pain when her claws dug into their scalp.

“Who let animals in?!” Someone shouted. Kairi laughed/barked at that and dodged aside when someone tried to catch her. Cancelling the henge as soon as she was on the floor and behind a corner, she met up with her teammates.

“That was fun.” She remarked to the boys. Hara snorted while Souseki was still grinning disturbingly. Without much ado, the trio walked up to the final stairs and found the room where some of the genin were already gathered at.

* * *

Kairi took a seat by the benches lining the classroom/auditorium. The same benches that the chuunin proctors would sit on later during the written portion. Souseki and Hara sat next to her. All three of them looked around the room at the genin assembled there. Kairi noted that Team 1 was there already and so was the Oto team, Kabuto’s team and two out of three rookie teams of Konoha. Well, it was three-thirty-one. Bit less than half-an-hour left for the rest to arrive.

There was some vaguely familiar faces too that Kairi remembered from her previous exams. Like that team from Ame with a kunoichi that had shuriken shaped earring. Or that team from Taki dressed in kimonos. And… Oh, that Kusa team had Uzumaki Karin with them. While recognizing all three of them, only the two boys Kairi had actually seen before in the Iwa exams.

The doors opened a couple of times and every time everyone’s attention shifted to the newcomers, assessing, judging.

Team 3 arrived next. Neji’s eyes flickered to Kairi, the boy probably remembering her and her chakra from the training sessions, but didn’t indicated otherwise knowing her. Good. She really didn’t need Lee causing a scene.

The last team to arrive – not surprisingly considering the rules of narrative – was team 7. And Kairi’s suspicions about the Nara girl being Sakura’s replacement were confirmed. As Sakura was missing, the interactions between the rookie teams were tamer than in canon. Less explosive and loud. Though still noisy enough. It started with Yamanaka Ino who went to glomp Uchiha Sasuke.

“Sasuke, where’ve you been? Boy, you have no idea how much I was hoping you’d show up here. I’ve missed those broody good looks of yours.” The blonde Yamanaka girl said. Where was the honorific? Or were the rookies closer to each other in this universe?

“Took you guys long enough.” Nara Shikamaru spoke next. “I thought you were going to be late.”

“Of all the habits I could pick from sensei, that’s the one I want least. We got waylaid on the way in.” The Nara girl replied to her clan’s heir. Hmm… how close were they? Clans were quite big and most likely they knew each other from the Academy, but it could be that they were more directly related too.

“The genjutsu?”

“Nah. One of the other teams. Year above us. Rock Lee, Neji Hyuuga and Tenten. Watch out for them.” Huh. Kairi blinked. Western order when addressing people? But in Suna and Iwa both they had eastern order. Kairi had noted that people used longer and more formal name of other villages than of their own but that was just natural. Home was home after all. But this… This was interesting quirk. Was it just the language that was pseudo-Japanese or some other cultural/universal difference?

“Well, well, whaddaya know? It looks like the whole gang’s back together again.” Inuzuka Kiba approached his former classmates with his team.

_“Backstreet’s back alright…”_

“You guys too, huh? Man, everyone’s here for this stupid this.” Shikamaru complained.

“Yup, here we all are. The Nine Rookies. This is going to be fun. At least… for those of us good enough to make the cut. Right, Sasuke?” Kiba’s tone was… not _wrong_ per say but different. Now that Kairi really thought about it, so had Ino been.

“Kiba. Careful you don’t get overconfident.” Sasuke replied to the challenge. He was more relaxed than expected as well.

“Just you wait. We’re going to blow you guys away. We’ve been training like crazy.”

“What do you think we’ve been doing?” Naruto rose to the bait but not biting it. “Sitting around picking daisies? You don’t know what training means!”

“Uh, don’t mind Kiba. I’m sure he didn’t really mean anything by it.” Hinata said then. ‘Speaking up’ was a bit wrong word since Kairi could barely hear her voice despite how well the slight shifts of the air currents in the room had carried the rest of the conversation to her. It was a handy eavesdropping method that didn’t even require that much chakra. Kairi first jounin instructor had taught it to her, Koto and Yomi during their first year as genin. Haruko had been a good sensei. Strict but fair.

“Don’t worry about it, Hinata.” The Nara girl told the Hyuuga. Damn, what was her name? “We’re all going to do our best.”

“Damn right we are.” Ino agreed with her… friend? “I didn’t come here to let some little test beat me.”

“Sheesh, you guys sound confident.” And there was Kabuto, in his way to ‘help’ the rookies and gain their trust. Kairi kept her face impassive but her eyes followed the spy’s movements. Her hand went to her pocket where a little slip of paper was tucked away. The paper was from Natsuhiko-sensei. And it was Kairi’s job to get it to the Oto spy. She didn’t know what was written in it and she didn’t want to know.

Kairi didn’t like Kabuto. Hadn’t liked as Katie and still didn’t like him. He was interesting and complex yes but she liked him better before his backstory. When she thought of him as the boy saved from warzone and just Orochimaru’s spy. Not when he was Root agent that had worked in many countries and later became an Orochimaru-copy that immediately hopped into Madara-bandwagon. His originality was stripped away with that. While he reformed himself during the war… Just no. Kairi didn’t want to interact with him.

“I mean, no offence, but you are the nine rookies, right? Fresh out of the Academy. I wouldn’t go making a spectacle of yourselves. You might wanna try keeping it down.” True.

“Well who asked you?” Ino snapped at the boy. “Who are you?”

“I’m Kabuto Yakushi. But really-…”

At this point Kairi glanced at the Nara girl who’d frozen stiff. It wasn’t quite killing intent that went through the tiny girl but something akin to it. Something very subtle stemmed from strong and sudden emotions but without clear direction and intent, thus only lurking beneath skin. It was all in body-language and with the girl so young and inexperienced, she couldn’t quite conceal it.

Kabuto showed his ninja-info cards. One with statistics about the participating genin team by country. Kairi remembered the statistics too. It was all in her Archive. 153 individuals overall. 51 teams. Ten from Suna, seven from Ame, two from Kusa and Taki both, one from Oto and Getsu and… 28 teams from Konoha.

“Do those cards of yours have any info on the other candidates? Individually?” Sasuke asked the older boy. Technically it was possible to scout out people during the week after the jounin instructors nominate the kids but… stats about strength and missions, especially of those out of village, were impossible to find. Not to mention the sheer amount of cards the guy had. It was impossible to get information out of everyone even if some were retaking the exam in such a timeframe. And those things should’ve alerted people.

“Well, I can’t promise my information is complete or perfect. But I’ve got something on just about everyone. Including you guys, of course. So which one is it? Anything you know about them. A description, where they’re from, whatever.” Kabuto told the boy.

“Rock Lee.” Sasuke said.

“And the team from Sand with… Gaara.” The Nara girl added. Huh, yet another deviation. Before Sasuke said both of the names. Kairi really shouldn’t be surprised anymore.

“Aww, you even know their names. That’s no fun.” Kabuto complained good-naturedly. “Let’s see…”

Kairi already knew the stats of Lee and Gaara both so she tuned out of the conversation. Instead, she plotted how to get the paper she had to Kabuto. Most likely during the written portion when they all were sitting in the chairs. She was pretty decent with chakra strings. Or then she could boldly introduce herself to him. They’d seen in previous exams too after all and ‘shared the misfortune’.

“Well, at least you’re confident.” Kabuto told Naruto and Kiba as he made to leave. “Maybe that will be enough, yeah? I better get back to my team. The exam will probably start soon.”

The older boy walked away from the rookies, first towards the aisle between the row of desks but with a flick of her wrist, Kairi attracted his attention. Well, actually she used a chakra string to snag his ankle. Not to pull or trip him. Just enough to hold and gain his attention. Once she got it, Kairi got on her feet and approached the older boy.

“Nice to see another veteran and familiar face here, Yakushi-san.” The girl greeted. And technically she wasn’t lying. It was just that she didn’t want to see _this_ particular face.

“Ah, Fuukatsu-san.” Kabuto smiled back and _of course_ he knew her name. “I see you’re trying again. Better luck this time?”

“The same to you.” She offered her hand for shaking. The older teen took it. The paper changed location. “I won’t be holding back though.” _Unlike you._

“I wouldn’t expect it.” _Give me a good show._

“Good luck for the big day.” _Even if it won’t be like expected._

“The same to you.” _Don’t forget your mission._

And they parted ways just when the proctors from Intelligence division arrived in an explosion of chakra. Kairi let her eyes follow the spy’s back while her teammates got up and sidled next to her. They were quiet but not suspicious of her. That and they didn’t want the proctors’ attention either.

“Alright, you baby-faced degenerates! Pipe it down and listen up!” Morino Ibiki bellowed. “It’s time to begin. I’m Ibiki Morino, your proctor and from this moment… your worst enemy.”

That was certainly dramatic. And… Kairi just realized that the Oto team hadn’t attacked Kabuto. Why? What had changed? What happened in canon that didn’t happen here to provoke the Oto-nin any further…

Naruto. Naruto didn’t announce to beat everyone in the room. He was calmer and not agitated by Kiba and Ino and…

Pages and images flashed past Kairi’s eyes as she accessed her Archive. Yes, it needed a capital letter. But because the whole discussion between the rookies and later with Kabuto had been so different. Could it really be that the Nara girl was behind it all? Kairi knew butterfly and ripple effects but that girl hadn’t even spoken that much yet…

 _“Just how much influence have you had on your friends, little deer?”_ Kairi thought with narrowed eyes as she glanced at the group still by the door. It was going to be interesting but how much all these changes would affect the plot?

“Now if we’re ready, we’ll proceed to the first stage of the chunin exam. Hand over your paperwork. In return you’ll be given a number. This number determines where you will sit. We’ll start the written test once you’re all seated.” Ibiki explained just in time for Kairi to tune in to listen to the instructions.

“Written test?” Hara hissed. Souseki sighed in dismay.

“So… disappointing for Konoha to assign written test.” The prissy boy muttered. Shouldn’t he be happy that he didn’t need to go to the forest now?

Three registration forms in exchange for the paper exams and the seat numbers. The number plates had been organized in groups of three, making sure that the members of the same team weren’t sitting anywhere near each other.

Place number thirty-five. Approximate in the middle of the left part of the third row. Each row had fifteen genin sitting and doing the test. Kairi’s both teammates were sitting in the rows behind her.

“Everyone, eyes front.” Ibiki barked and began explaining the rules. Kairi kept her face impassive. She knew the rules and dearly hoped that neither of the boys would fail her. She looked at the chuunin sitting by the wall. Hagane Kotetsu, Kamizuki Izumo, Tobitake Tonbo… and naturally bunch of unknowns. Well, regardless, Kairi would be doing her best.

“You have one hour total. Begin!”

* * *

Scratching of pens filled the room. Kairi read through all the questions. The answering space was ridiculously small for some of them. But nevertheless, no run of the mill genin could answer those questions. Not necessarily many chuunin either.

“Umm… I’d just like to know one thing…” A girl got up from her seat. She was from Suna too. Nejiri was her name. “How many teams will pass this test?”

“It’s not like knowing will help you.” Ibiki answered. “Or do you want to be disqualified?”

“No, sorry…” Nejiri sat back down. Kairi felt sorry for the girl. She wouldn’t be promoted in these exams either.

No matter though. She needed to concentrate on her own answers. The cipher was easy, Kairi used those all the time. Math was alright. History very easy. Economics, blegh but alright too. Politics she liked even less. Physiology… so and so.

Around her people were more or less cheating. And some were getting caught. She finished with the ninth question and was lying her pen on the table when a strange sensation took her over. Like falling sleep but it was too sudden to actually happen. But there was no strange smell so it wasn’t drugs. Besides neither genin next to her were reacting the same.

But Kairi didn’t have a chance to ponder about her situation when she was already falling yet her body remained seated.

_“What is going on?”_

It was like she was showed back and as a passenger in her own body. Kairi found herself sitting on a giant book in a clearing that had the map of the world drawn to the ground. There were some trees and flowers but they didn’t seem… natural. Not really.

_“Where am I?”_

Kairi twisted on her seat and looked at the cover of the book. It was her family book. Looking around the clearing, she found bookshelves between the trees.

_“Is this a genjutsu? Or my mind?”_

Mind… Hadn’t she been sitting around in the same line than where Sakura had sat in canon? Straight on the firing line for Ino to use her family jutsu.

 _“Just brilliant…”_ Kairi sighed. _“But I guess this isn’t the intended side-effect for the Yamanaka jutsu. I’m simply different from the rest.”_

Then as suddenly as she had been pushed back, she was brought back to reality. Kairi’s hand caught the edge of the desk to brace herself against when she was in control of her body once more. Her pen and paper had moved a couple of centimeters to the right while she’d been… absent.

“Sloppy…” The teen muttered. “Very sloppy, Ino-chan…”

Not only for the fact that Kairi noticed that someone else had touched her answer paper but the proctors certainly noticed Ino using the jutsu on her.

People were getting caught more and more.

**_Slam!_ **

“Do you have any proof that I cheated 5 times?” Komaza, a Suna-nin just called out shouted at the proctors. Are you guys really watching us at all-…”

Tobitake Tonbo slammed the boy to the wall.

“Listen, among chunins we are the elite that were assembled to watch over this exam. We haven’t missed anything you’ve done. You could say that this strength is our proof.”

The boy and his team was escorted out.

* * *

More time passed. Kankuro implemented his plan and went to visit the bathroom and returned just in time for the final question.

“Listen up! Here’s the tenth and final question. But first, there are some things you need to know. These rules are unique to question ten, so listen carefully and try not to let them frighten you.” Ibiki announced. Not frighten. Yeah, right. Kairi snorted but listened to the rules anyways. People protested. Temari, Kiba and many others. And the situation just stretched and stretched. People dropped out. And then Naruto did… well, it was probably an early form of Talk no Jutsu.

“Don’t underestimate me! I don’t quit and I don’t run! You can act tough all you want, but you guys aren’t going to scare me off! No way. I don’t care if I do get stuck as a genin for the rest of my life. I’ll still become Hokage someday!”

“Well, I admire your determination, if nothing else.” Ibiki replied and gave a dramatic pause. Were all Konoha-nin dramatic assholes? “For those of you remaining, there’s just one thing left to do. That’s for me to tell you… you’ve passed the First Exam.”

Kairi sighed in relief, letting the tension pour out of her. She had gotten through. Hara and Souseki hadn’t failed either. She survived that Yamanaka mind-jutsu thing.

“Hold on, what just happened?” Someone asked. Kairi saw them wearing a Taki headband.

“There never was one. Not a written one at least.” And wasn’t it disturbing how the head of T&I was grinning happily now. A complete one-eighty from his previous attitude. “Actually, you could say that your decision to stay was the answer to the tenth question.”

“Wait a second, so the other nine questions you gave us were just a waste of time? Is that what you’re saying?” Temari demanded angrily. Damn, she had temper. Kairi had forgotten it even if she’d seen plenty of examples of it during academy.

“No, not at all. Quite the opposite. The first nine questions had an important overriding purpose. To test your abilities to surreptitiously gather strategic intelligence under the most adverse circumstances.”

Intelligence and infiltration. Two things quickly becoming Kairi’s specialties. The girl dug out one of her card decks and began shuffling it while listening attentively. She needed to do something with her hands to destress herself.

“Information. It can be the most valuable weapon in battle. How well you gather information can determine whether a mission is a failure or a success. There’ll be times you have to risk your life to get it.”

Pen is mightier than sword.

Knowledge is power.

Books! Best weapons in the world!

The previous world was full of quotes and wisdoms promoting learning and knowledge. It was theme in fantasy books where the greatest weapon wasn’t a sword or anything like that but something intangible. And limiting information was a way for the dictators to gain control over their people. Censorship, forbidden books, blocked websites… Times changed but the methods remained the same and carried over to other worlds too.

And Ibiki’s scars under his bandana were truly horrifying. Were those from the last war? Kairi couldn’t imagine torture like that being implemented during peacetime no matter how rocky the relationship between villages was. But during war Ibiki would’ve been… A preteen? Same age than Kakashi anyways. So maybe not during war then. It was doubtful that he would’ve been in a position to be captured and then survive the torture. So peacetime torture it was then. How fun…

Kairi pulled a faced but kept shuffling her cards while the explanation continued and Ibiki finally covered his head again.

“…Can you chose to avoid danger? No. There will be many missions that seem almost suicidal if you think about it. But you do not think about it. You think only of the goal achieving it through courage and discipline. These are the qualities required of a chunin squad leader.”

And that was why after Hatake Sakumo, the White Fang, hero of Second Great Shinobi War, was scorned and looked down upon and blamed and beaten down. Why he chose to take his own life so his son didn’t need to live in the shame he brought to his name. Why, despite him saving his teammates lives like Konoha promoted their shinobi to do, he was driven into corner, friendless and alone and with no other way out than with his trademark tanto. He broke the rules. He was considered trash. And abandoned by his friends and comrades. Those essentially worse than trash.

Kairi admired the man. And despised his teammates. And she was certain that Danzo had something to do with the failure. Either faulty information or deliberately wrong information. After all the old goat was a warmonger and puppetmaster.

“You have earned the right to continue on to the next step. You have passed through the first gate. I hereby declare this stage of the Chunin Selection Examination completed. There’s nothing left but to wish you all good luck.” Ibiki concluded his speech.

And then the window broke.

“Heads up, boys and girls, this is no time to be celebrating! I’ll be your next proctor, Anko Mitarashi!” The woman who emerged from a bundle of cloth announced. And wow, she wasn’t wearing a bra under that fishnet. Well, at least her trench coat was obscuring her assets slightly. But the entrance… Kairi couldn’t help but giggle quietly at the woman.

“78? Ibiki? You let 26 teams to pass?” Anko asked her superior officer. “Easiest first exam in ages!”

“There are a lot of good candidates this time.” The head of T&I replied.

“Bah, that’s fine. I’ll cut them at least in half in the second test.” The woman scoffed before turning to the genin still seated. “Alright, you maggots have had it easy, but thing will be different starting first thing in the morning. Meet me at Training Ground 44. Dismissed!”

And that was that. Kairi got up from her seat and swept out of the room, Hara and Souseki following after her.

“I’m glad that neither of you did nothing stupid.”

“The test was easy. Gathering information even easier.” Souseki smiled but didn’t elaborate. Hara was scowling. He probably didn’t fare that well and had banked on scraping the last points from the last question. Like Naruto had in canon.

“I see.” The girl nodded. “Now excuse me, I’m going back to hotel.”

Five days together with the boys, she deserved some alone time before that. And maybe she could go to check that yakiniku place too. She was hungry and who knew what she could eat once that the forest. She had no idea if anything there was edible or if she’d have to live with rations.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Second phase of irritation.

**As the sea calls 6  
Hansel and Gretel**

The morning saw all the 26 teams at the Training Ground 44. It was a round area of giant trees and wildlife surrounded by a tall fence with 44 gates. There was thirteen teams from Konoha, four from Suna, five from Ame, two from Kusa, and one from Oto and Taki.

The place looked even more impressive up close and while excited to get and explore the place, Kairi also knew that the participants from Suna would be in serious disadvantage. Ame, Kusa, Oto and Taki all had trees even if they weren’t exactly dense forests like the environment presented before them. And of course Konoha-nin were practically in their favorite element.

“This is the location for the second phase of the exam. It’s Training Ground 44, but we call it… the Forest of Death.” Anko introduced, smiling the entire time. Sadist.

“Forest of Death. Pff. Do your worst!” Naruto shouted from somewhere on Kairi’s left. Damn, he was loud. “You’re not going to scare me away! I can handle anything!”

“So… looks like we’ve got ourselves a tough guy.” The special jounin smiled and Kairi didn’t exactly see what happened but she remembered it anyways. Anko threw kunai past Naruto, earning the boy a scratch on his cheek, and then going and licking the blood off. Creepy. And then Orochimaru, disguised as Kusa shinobi Shiore, returned the kunai to Anko, with his tongue. Super creepy and really disgusting too.

“Why thank you Grass-nin.” Anko told the other ‘woman’. “You know, I only recommend you stand this close behind me if you wish to reach a premature end.”

“My pardon. With the sight of blood on your blade slicing through my hair, I’m afraid I became a little excited. I meant you know harm.” Orochimaru replied. Kairi shuddered at the way he spoke. She really didn’t want to run into him in the forest, temporally ally of Suna or not. And officially Kairi didn’t even know about Oto being an ally. Only that Suna would strike on the day of the finals.

“Seems like everyone here today is quick tempered. There must be something in the air.” Anko mused then, moving away from Naruto. “Now before we begin this test, I have something to hand out to you all. It’s just a standard consent form. Before the test, all of you are going to have to read over this form and then sign it.”

“What for?” Naruto asked. While it was a bit strange that only he was asking questions, it was good that at least someone was.

“Some of you may not come back from this test. And I have to get your consent for that risk. Otherwise it would be my responsibility.” The papers were passed along all of the participants while Anko continued. “Now, I’ll explain what you’ll be doing in this test. The first thing you need to know is that this test will tax every one of your survival skills. First, I’ll give you all a description of the terrain on the practice field.”

The map of the area was shown. Kairi whipped out her notebook she’d used to record her speed and drew a rough sketch of the area on it. River flowing from north-west to south-east where it split into two. Tower in the middle and a ten kilometer radius to any direction of the tower.

“The 44th Training Ground had 44 locked gates. There are rivers and a forest inside. In the centre is a locked tower, located 10 kilometers each gate.” Anko was explaining to the rest. “You’ll be fighting to get both a Heaven Scroll and an Earth Scroll. Altogether 26 teams will be taking part in this test, so half of those teams will be going after the Heaven Scroll and the other half will be trying to get the Earth Scroll. I’ll hand over one kid of scroll to each team and that’s what you’ll be fighting for.”

“Okay.” Sasuke spoke up. “So how do we pass the test?”

“Your entire squad must bring both a Heaven and Earth Scroll to the central tower within five days.”

“Completely surrounded by enemies, we won’t have time to rest. We’ll have to keep a constant watch.” The Uchiha stated with narrowed eyes.

“Right.” Anko nodded at the observation. “This test also measures endurance behind enemy lines. This is designated to be a grueling test, and I’m sure some of you won’t be up for the challenge.”

“So… let’s say, mid-exam, can we just quit?” Shikamaru asked.

“Of course not. In the middle of a battle you can’t just quit. Well, I guess you could but it’s probably going to get you killed.” Came the flippant reply. “There are also some ways you can get disqualified. First, if all three members can’t make it to the tower with both scrolls. Second, if a team loses a member or a member becomes incapacitated and cannot continue. But most importantly, none of you, absolutely none of you, may look at the contents of the scroll until you reach the tower.”

Hara scoffed. “Obviously.”

Well, at least it was certain that he wouldn’t screw with that part of the test. One thing less to worry about.

“What if it just happens to flap open and you read it?” Naruto asked. Of course he did.

“Children… Everything forbidden must be prodded.” Kairi muttered, rubbing her forehead. Her cousin was… an idiot. He could think on his feet and be surprisingly smart occasionally but he was also so incredibly… dense. Yet… Kairi really wanted to get to know him. But not now. Not yet. She had to wait… Maybe even until Naruto returned from his training trip with Jiraiya. If that were to even happen in this world. Probably yes, but Kairi couldn’t be too sure anymore.

“Let me put it this way, young man. You. Don’t. Want. To. Know.” Anko replied the boy, still smiling. “There are times when a ninja will be asked to carry secret documents. The scroll rule it to test your integrity. Okay, we’re done. Each team, take your consent forms and exchange them over there for scrolls.” The woman pointed at the booth where a couple of chuunin were manning it. “After that, you’ll be taken to a gate and the exam can start.”

Kairi read her form and signed her name on it. Hara and Souseki followed the suite. A curtain was being pulled around the booth, obscuring the view of the genin. Thus they couldn’t know which scroll went to which team and who of the team members was holding it.

“So we’re going blind into this…” Souseki murmured, shooting a dirty look at the booth and to the woods itself then. He apparently wanted it all to be over and done with quickly. Prissy bastard. Thankfully not vocal though.

“If you have some good spying tactic in mind, you are welcome to share.” Kairi said dryly.

“Sorry, no. But we probably should go the get our scroll before other teams try anything.” The boy replied.

“I agree.” Hara muttered.

* * *

“So… You’re from Suna.” One of the chuunin went through the consent forms and wrote down their names. “Jyari Hara, Souseki Nagaya and Kairi Fuukatsu.”

Kairi held back a twitch of her mouth when she noticed Hara ready to retort at the wrong order of names. Souseki didn’t look much happier either but kept his mouth shut.

“Here is your scroll. You’ll start at gate 19.” Next chuunin gave a black scroll to them. Earth.

“I’ll take it.” Hara grabbed the scroll and tucked it to his weapons pouch. Kairi considered fighting for it but decided not to. The situation would only escalate and she might end up attacking her own teammate. And she really didn’t want to be disqualified for that reason.

* * *

The teams went to get their scrolls. Thankfully it didn’t take long. Kairi didn’t like waiting and she was getting pretty much impatient. Like a strong gust of wind trapped in a jar. She wanted to act, not sit and wait idly.

“Listen up! All the teams have received their scrolls, so everybody go your gate and wait there. When the gates open, the test is on!” Anko told them.

Gate nineteen… With they all at gate one and the circumference of the fence being over 60 kilometers… 62 and bit more actually. That distance divided with 44… distance between the gates was bit less than one and half kilometers… 1.4 actually. That multiplied by 19 in the other hand was 27.

“Twenty-five kilometers until our gate. Let’s hurry.” Even if the start time would be around half past two.

* * *

Two-thirty the gates were opened. Kairi, Hara and Souseki dashed into the woods and up to the trees. While on the way Kairi flipped through what she could find from her archive. Having cheat-codes was sort of handy and she didn’t feel sorry at all for using them.

 _“The Oto team is one gate to right. No team is at the gate directly on the left but afterwards there is Konohan team, Team 8, Kusa team with Orochimaru, empty gate and then Team 7.”_ Kairi thought. The Konoha team between them and Team 8 was probably the one that got targeted by the leeches. So definitely not that way.

The girl dug out her notebook and flipped open the map she’d drawn and started marking the little info she could get from her Archive. She almost could remember what scroll each team had as it had also been listed at wikia back them but for the life she couldn’t recall them at the moment. Well, maybe didn’t need to.

“Alright. Let’s stop here.” Hara announced and landed on a branch. Souseki and Kairi landed either side of him. “We’re going to split up and scrounge food and search other teams. This way we’ll cover more ground much quicker.” The boy dropped three kunai to form a triangle shape on the branch. “We’ll meet back here in two hours.”

“Are you sure you want us to split at this point already? We should secure our rations yes but there are all of the teams still in the game and at their strongest at this point. It’s not safe for us to be on our own yet.” Souseki frowned.

“I’m the team leader. I make the decisions in this team like I’ve done before.” Hara growled.

“Nagaya is correct though.” Kairi said. “We should look for a place to camp and remain stationary for the remainder of the day. We only have bit less than five hours of daylight left and in the middle of woods even less.”

**_“AAHH!!”_ **

A scream echoed throughout the forest. It was the Konoha team confronted by Team 8.

“First team down.” Kairi said. “I sounded close. We better continue moving. I suggest north.”

“The screams came from south-west so I agree.” Souseki nodded.

“Fine…” Hara groused. “We’ll find a camping place and then split to search for supplies.”

“That sounds viable.” Souseki agreed. Kairi sighed but steeled herself.

She could do this.

* * *

The place to camp and rest at came in a form of a giant hollow tree which had dried up and remained standing. Not rotten at all despite the humidity of the air.

Hara placed the three kunai mark on the ground in the shadow of the tree and then ‘ordered’ them all to scatter.

 _“Don’t fight, don’t fight… Don’t fight or you end up killing him…”_ Kairi hummed the mantra and headed north-west.

Her exploring came to abrupt stop when she head a familiar noise and muffled screams. It was something she could never forget hearing. The sound of sand crushing things around it. Had she really wandered this close to Gaara’s team and the soon-dead Ame-team?

Kairi landed on a branch overlooking the small clearing. Team 8 was hiding in the bushes. Sand was wrapped around two Ame-nin, the first one being already crushed to death.

“Bye bye…” Temari waved at them.

Then two other sickening cracks could be heard. Kairi pulled a face. While quick and relatively painless, that was also incredibly messy way to die.

“How lucky, it’s the Heaven Scroll.” Kankuro picked up the scroll one of the Ame-nin tried to offer them in exchange of their lives. “Ok, let’s head for the tower.”

“Shut up. I haven’t had enough yet.” Gaara glared. Had he heard when Team 8 tried to leave or was he a sensor too?

“Let’s stop, Gaara.”

“Are you afraid? Coward.”

“Gaara! You may be alright, but this is too dangerous for us!” The puppeteer spoke up, walking closer to his younger sibling. “We only need one scroll! Any more it…”

“Don’t tell me what to do. You piece of trash.” The red-head prepared to twist his wrist and end the lives of the Konohan team too. All the while being engaged in staring contest with the older boy.

“Gaara. Leave it. You’ve done everything needed of this day already.” Kairi spoke up from her perch. The Suna siblings and also the Team 8 looked up at her.

“Kairi…” The jinchuuriki narrowed his eyes at the girl he wasn’t allowed to kill. “What do you want?”

“I heard some noise and came to investigate. I need to return to my team soon though. In the meanwhile…” The girl deliberately looked down at Team 8. “Those rookies are no harm to you. And you’ve not laid your eyes on them yet, have you? Thus you have no reason to kill them.”

Logic. While Shukaku had temper and could twist Gaara’s opinions and emotions, it was logic that got through to the boy. It was logic that made him follow orders even if he had no loyalty to the village itself.

“Fine…” The boy formed a cork for his gourd and plugged it in. He turned around and began walking towards the tower in the north. Kairi let out a sigh of relief, tension leaving her once again.

“Kairi-san… Thank you.” Temari told the girl before following after her little brother. Kankuro nodded at the blonde too.

“You’re welcome.” Kairi muttered and with one last glance at team 8 of Konoha, she left the clearing and the corpses there behind her.

* * *

Kairi was just returning to the camp site when she felt it. A strong gust of wind and the following killing intent, saturating the entire forest with it. The girl landed shakily and fell on her knees. While confronting many strong enemies, none of them had given out a killing intent such as this. It wasn’t passive like Gaara’s which was directed at everyone. Not this was focused and active but without care of who would be trampled in the process.

Souseki landed next to Kairi.

“You felt it too?”

“Hard not to. That’s practically a beacon for everyone to stay the fuck away from there.” The girl nodded and got back on her feet. “I… I found some edible berries and mushrooms. There’s a rabbit’s hole about five-hundred meters east but it might be empty.”

“I checked out the river. The water there is drinkable.” Souseki told her. “There was also some bird nests nearby but I decided not to disturb them just yet.”

“I think we should use what we can find during the first days and save our ration bars until we are too exhausted to scavenge. They don’t go bad after all and we don’t know how long we’ll be here in the end.”

“Sounds reasonable.” The boy nodded. “We should wait for Jyari-kun to arrive so we can continue making plans.”

“Yeah…”

Eventually Hara arrived too, looking harried and shaken. He had also felt the killing intent. On his arms he had a stack of firewood.

“Let’s rest.” The self-appointed leader said. “It’s soon dark anyways. We’ll set up a watch and cook dinner.”

“Did you guys see anything interesting while in the woods?” Souseki asked when they sat down to prepare the mushrooms and berries into a makeshift soup-slash-stew. Hara captured them a rabbit which he skinned and gutted for the stew. While Kairi did not have a stellar opinion of the boy, she did admit that he knew basics quite well.

“Nothing interesting.” Hara shrugged. “You?”

“A couple of teams were already heading for the tower but I guess it was only to set up an ambush. I also saw a Konoha team captured in a net and the ground covered in big leaches. They were barely alive.”

“I saw Gaara slaughter an Ame team and then almost kill one of the Konoha rookie teams who were watching from the bushes.” Kairi replied. “Team 1 is probably already at the tower since they got their needed scroll from the Ame team.”

“Kazekage’s children are all powerhouses and monsters and the youngest one is the worst of them all.” Hara scoffed. “I’m glad I don’t need to be anywhere near him.”

“Yes… Temari-san is cruel and brutal when it comes to her enemies, Kankuro-kun has a hair-trigger temper and Gaara is plain blood-thirsty.” Kairi agreed slowly. While she didn’t like speaking ill of any of them, it didn’t mean that she was wrong either. Each of the Seand Siblings were difficult to work with and she thanked her lucky stars that she’d had no need for that prior these exams.

* * *

The stew was moderately good considering the circumstances. As they prepared for rest Kairi used her fan to scatter the smell of food so it wouldn’t attract predators, human and animal alike. The fire still burned, providing light for them. While it could attract enemies, that’s what watch was for. And the traps laid on the surrounding area.

Hara took the first watch and woke up Souseki for the next one. Meaning that Kairi had the last and worst one. Well, she could handle it.

During the night she had a lot of time to think about the exam and the teams. What she’d seen, heard and felt thus far, supported canon but at any moment the things would diverge. But how… that was the question.

In any case Kairi needed to act quickly and get the scroll. Or two because it was likely that Hara would force them to split the first thing in the morning and there was no guarantee that when they’d meet again, Hara would still be in the possession of their scroll.

* * *

Kairi’s prediction proved correct when, after eating the remaining berries for breakfast, Hara told them to dismantle the traps and get moving. Apparently they wouldn’t stay another night in the same spot. Sensible.

But apparently this time splitting meant that Kairi was alone while the boys stuck together. Well, fine. She could do this on her own too. Probably.

The girl headed towards the river. There she’d probably meet a lot of teams who’d still have their scrolls. And there she’d ambush them. Especially Konoha-nin were bound to underestimate her a Suna-nin born at desert in such environment.

Kairi landed with a minimal splash on top of the water. While different from sand or even tree walking, the fundamentality between the three was the same. The use of chakra at one’s feet in order to progress on an unconventional terrain.

She laid a hand on top of the water to support herself and detect vibrations while she concentrated on the air around her. She was out in the open. She was basically begging people to attack her straight forwardly. Not that they’d hit her. Genjutsu existed after all and with it Kairi produced an image of herself two meters before her while hiding herself. The genjutsu was about her less threatening appearance that she used to fool Genma and Gai. Something to make people underestimate her.

And soon enough a barrage of kunai flew through the air. Kairi made her genjutsu to turn and try to dodge but ultimately failing.

“Gah!” The image let out, momentarily sinking into the water but pulling herself up then and glaring up at the attackers. A Konohan team. The image had bleeding wounds but she pulled the imaginary kunai from her arms and side out letting them sink into the water just like the original kunai had after phasing through the illusion.

“Little Suna girl. You look lost.” One of the attackers sneered. The other two chuckled at it.

“I’m not.”

Kairi moved behind her genjutsu and created a wind clone inside it. Then she jumped up to the nearest cliff that allowed her have the high ground. Moral and otherwise.

The first one of the Konoha-nin jumped down to attack the presumably weakened and injured girl. When hitting the clone, he got slashed by wind blades.

“What…” The boy let out before sinking into water, his blood already starting to dye it red. He wasn’t moving. The cuts had been so sudden and so deep that there was no hope for him.

“She took down Mebachi!” Another genin shouted.

“We need to get out of here…” His friend whimpered. Kairi dislodged her fan and flipped it open. One hundred and twenty degrees open, o-point-seven meter radius and a handle clicking into place that was also o-point-seven meters long. Black metal with faint golden sheen on the fabric of the fan and the wrappings on the handle. Kairi could use it both one and two handedly, depending on the situation and the technique. Her fan’s name was Kogonhi – Golden Ratio – which was funny because golden ratio was also known as golden cut. Something that she was very proficient in doing with the fan.

The click alerted the two genin who looked up at the cliff where Kairi was standing, her fan at ready.

“Hello. I apologize the inconvenience but I’m going to take your scroll.” She smiled. Yes, she had just killed their teammate. But in these exams, just like in real life, it was kill or be killed. But she didn’t take pleasure in it. No, she was cold, swift and clean when killing her opponents. Like nightly desert wind.

“You… You killed Mebachi!” Genin number two screamed. “You will pay!” Kunai was drawn and thrown. Kairi waved her fan and steered them aside. The genin clapped his hands together then and began going through hand seals for a fire jutsu.

“Stop! Don’t you see she is wind type! Even if fire is superior we might too -…” His friend yelled at him but too late. Fire was lit. Kairi twisted and jumped down the cliff, her fan weaving through the air and fanning the flames on. If not for the river and thus moist ground and plants, the fire probably would’ve spread much further. The girl landed lightly on top of the water once again, right next to Mebachi. She went through his pockets and pouches, finding Heaven scroll from him. How lucky.

“Now… I don’t necessarily need to kill you here, especially considering that you are disqualified anyways. But what you decide to do next, has everything to do as to what I’ll do to you.” The girl spoke, slipping the scroll into her backpack.

“You bitch…” The genin number two growled.

“Yeah, no.” Kairi deadpanned.

“You will pay.”

“You already said that.”

“I’ll make you pay!” And he dashed towards the girl. Kairi lifted her fan and spun around in spot once. She channeled her chakra through the metal, into the kanji for ‘wind’ painted on the fabric.

**“Fuuton: Kinkazekiri no jutsu!”  
(Wind Release: Gold wind cutter technique)**

It took down both genin. Gold may be a soft metal but it was pure too. Chemically as well as spiritually. And thus it the attack, imbued with wind chakra that was naturally half spiritual, worked so well.

“That’s one team down.” Kairi mused, looking at the three bodies floating in the river. The water wasn’t probably drinkable anymore. “I need to go and meet with the boys now.” She unfolded her fan and clasped it behind her back before jumping back to the trees.

Momentarily she thought she felt something nasty in the woods but it was gone soon enough.

“I wonder what that was…”

* * *

On her way to find her team (why hadn’t they agreed on a meeting spot?), Kairi came across a gruesome sight. A Kusa team slaughtered by a boar. The smell of blood but lack of smell of rotting flesh indicated that they hadn’t been dead for long.

“Karin…” The girl gasped, dropping down at the sight of red hair. Yet another difference. Sasuke hadn’t saved the girl and thus the sensor-medic Uzumaki was now out of counting. _“Well, at least Orochimaru didn’t get her…”_

Kairi felt bad to go through the girl’s and her friends’ possessions but she did find another Earth scroll from there. It would become handy later.

“You will definitely need that one.” A voice spoke up from above. Kairi looked up. Kabuto was standing in the branches.

“Oh yeah?” The girl asked.

“Yes. Since my team just acquired your team’s earth scroll.” The spy smiled pushing his glasses up. “Don’t worry, they’re still alive. But you should probably hurry to help them.”

“You wouldn’t mind telling me whereabouts they are?” Kairi hedged. This situation… wasn’t surprising per say but she hadn’t expected it to be Kabuto’s team that took the scroll. Admittedly they were really good.

“Three hundred meters to north-east.”

“Thank you, Kabuto-san.” The girl nodded and the two of them departed ways.

* * *

Hara was unconscious while Souseki had broken arm and a black eye. Both of them suffered from chakra exhaustion.

“So… You lost the scroll.” Kairi deadpanned.

“Yes… The Konoha team was going easy on us though.”

“I see. Well, thankfully I got heaven scroll from one team and scavenged earth scroll from another one’s corpses.”

“Oh?” The boy blinked. “That’s… good. Thanks.”

“Can you wake up Hara? I can give you both soldier pills once we have eaten.” The girl dug out three ration bars and bottle of water.

Souseki crouched to shake Hara awake. Disoriented the other boy was and thankfully ate and drank slowly and in silence.

“Do you think you can run?” Kairi asked. “I have the scrolls. We can get to the tower now.”

“Yeah…” Hara muttered and got on his feet.

“Soldier pills for each of us. The tower is to north-north-west.” Kairi gave the one of the small round tablets for both boys and ate one then herself. Using wide-range genjutsu for multiple senses, an elemental clone and then her tessenjutsu had dented her reserves a bit too much for her to run safely the entire time to the tower. Especially if they’d need to fight other teams trying to ambush them.

Hara ate the pill and got on his feet, basically rejuvenated and already taking charge.

“Let’s go.”

Kairi just sighed. Souseki checked his own bandaged and braced arm but nodded. It was time to go.

* * *

Giving a soldier pill for a concussed was not a good idea. But in order to get out of the woods as fast as possible, they had no other choice. With Kairi leading and Souseki holding the rear while keeping an eye on Hara, the trio made their way towards the tower in the center of the area.

Thankfully they didn’t meet with other teams until very close to the tower. Kairi heard them before seeing them and thus attacked first. She twisted her fan open and waved it at the direction of the sound.

**“Fuuton: Ookaeami!”  
(Wind Release: Great Cast Net)**

The brilliant thing about nin-tessenjutsu was that it didn’t require hand seals as long as you knew the different forms and katas for using the fan. And judging by the cries and crashes, the ambushing team had been forced to retreat.

“That should keep them distracted…” Kairi said. “You guys hanging in there?”

“Yes. How long until we are at the tower?” Souseki asked.

“Just a couple of hundred meters. There shouldn’t be any other teams expecting us before that. Not so close to this one.” The girl replied.

And she was right. The trio arrived to the tower without much difficulties (other than Hara losing his footing when landing) and went in through one of the doors.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Preliminary matches familiar and not.

**As the sea calls 7**   
  


The room waiting for them was huge and empty. Considering the structure of the tower, it was reasonable to thing that all the other doors around the bottom floor led to similar rooms.

And up on the wall was a… riddle written for them.

_“If qualities of Heaven are your desire, acquire wisdom to take your mind higher. If qualities of Earth are what you lack, train your body and prepare to attack. When Heaven and Earth are open together, the peerless path will be righteous forever. This is the secret way that guides us from this place today.”_

“…The scrolls were also called heaven and earth.” Souseki pointed out after reading the riddle. “Maybe we should open them now.”

“Sound reasonable.” Kairi nodded and extracted the two scrolls from her back pack. The other one she gave the Hara who had two functional arms. Souseki had his broken arm in a sling now.

“On three.” Hara stated. “One, two, three.”

The two scrolls were opened, revealing the summoning technique inside.

“Toss it away!” Kairi gasped, throwing the heaven scroll to the floor. The earth scroll flew on top of it. With a plume of smoke a chuunin appeared on top of the two scrolls. Basic Konoha attire, bandana-style hitai-ate and dark brown hair over the right side of his face. Kamizuki Izumo.

“Ah, Suna genin.” The chuunin smirked. “All three in one piece and in the tower with both of the scrolls. Congrats, you passed the second phase of the exam.”

“Thank you, Shinobi-san.” Kairi nodded her head. “May I ask though, what is that little poem on the wall?”

“A poem? It’s much grander than that, little girl.” Izumo scoffed. “They are words from the First Hokage himself. The principles that chunin should follow.”

“Oh?” Souseki arched a brow but kept his face impassive. “How exactly then…”

“My other job here, than to simply congratulate you, is to explain it.” The chuunin told them. “Heaven is mental strength while earth is physical strength. If you are weak mentally you need to study and meditate to strengthen it, while if you lack physical strength, you need to train and gain stamina. All in all one needs to be strong in both aspects in order to be the perfect chuunin, just like the balance between the two in required in mixing chakra for techniques.”

“I see. That sounds quite reasonable.” Kairi smiled. “As expected of the first Shinobi no Kami.”

Izumo chuckled. “Yes, yes… Now, through those doors you’ll find rooms to stay in, a dining area and lounge rooms. The third exam commences only after the five days are up. Until then you are to stay in this tower. The three upper floors are out of bounds for the genin but otherwise you are free to roam the tower.”

“Understood. Let’s go, Souseki, Fuukatsu.” Hara moved to leave the room, swaying slightly until Souseki went to support him.

* * *

There were four other teams already which was quite surprising. While Kairi had expected the Sand Siblings and team 8 to be there already, the fact that other two rookie teams were too, came as a shock.

Kairi didn’t dwell on it though. Just ushered the boys to one of the barrack rooms available and began taking off her armor. It was dirty, as was the rest of her clothes and Kairi was tired. She wanted to eat and shower before crashing on the bed and sleeping. For a tower in the middle of the forest, it was quite well equipped for prolonged stay.

“I’m getting food for us.” Souseki announced and left then to look for the dining area.

“I’ll take the first turn in the shower then.” Kairi told the boys and went to the adjacent bathroom. It didn’t have hot water much but just enough that it wasn’t freezing cold. Probably moderated somehow to all the rooms that the water simply didn’t come any warmer than not-freezing. But it was lovely anyways. While they might have been in the woods only two days, it was still nice to get refreshed.

Kairi changed into clean shirt and pants. They were of the same model than the ones she’d previously worn, just different color in wine-red and dark grey. And as they were made of such a light and thin fabric, they packed really tightly into small space.

Souseki came back with food and all three of them began eating in silence. Ignoring them was like heaven-sent option for Kairi.

* * *

The next few days had Kairi exploring the tower and observing the changes once more. Late evening on the third day team 3 arrived and bunked in another room than the rookies. Interestingly enough the Oto team wasn’t seen at all. Considering their skill, they should’ve acquired the scrolls easily even if they lost their earth scroll to team 7. So what had happened this time to differ from canon?

Kairi didn’t get her answer until the day of preliminaries. Before that, she entertained herself by challenging the other genin into a game of poker. Or blackjack. Or Texas Hold’em. Or some other game. She also had Hanafuda cards with which she also played. Mainly her opponents were team 3(Lee and Tenten), team 8(Kiba) or Temari and Kankurou. Rock Lee was very enthusiastic to play even if he didn’t have skill. Tenten was calm and skilled though easily stressed. Kiba was… Kiba. And Temari and Kankuro had experience and knowledge to bow out when it was obvious that Kairi was winning. They didn’t play with money though, but with snapped chopsticks.

“How did you find the first phase?” Kairi asked when she was dealing the next round to the three Konoha genin sitting in front of her on the floor. They were playing Old Maid this time.

“It was… alright.” Tenten shrugged but eyed warily at the lion-sized summoning fox that the Suna girl was using as backrest.

“Don’t mind Shimon-san. He just wanted to check up on me. He looks gruff and scary but is real softie inside.” Kairi smiled, scratching the fox’s ears. Shimon snorted but leaned his large head against his paws then. He was the largest and fastest summon that Kairi could call to her help currently and she wanted him to familiarize himself with the smells of people there. If only in the case she run into them during the invasion, he’d know not to kill or grievously injure them. Or then downright avoid them. Konoha Twelve was out of bounds, and while his team wasn’t there yet, running into Kabuto was hazardous both because of his skill and because he was an ‘ally’.

Shimon was almost black fox and his name was written with the kanji for ‘death’ and ‘gate’. He was the older brother of Shirin and Shanna, the twins.

“Right…” Tenten flashed a smile and gathered her cards. “We got our missing scroll easily enough.”

“Our opponents gave us valiant fight but in the end we prevailed.” Rock Lee declared, flashing a thumbs up.

“Did you leave them alive?” Kairi asked. “Because some of the teams fight with the intent to kill or seriously main and then in order to survive your only chance is to fight fire with fire.”

“Ah, yes… Our opponents should still be alive.” Tenten said.

“Yes. They surrendered their scroll to us and decided to retreat.” Lee nodded but his thoughts seemed to be elsewhere. Like remembering something he’d seen… Kairi could only wonder. In canon Lee had found the camping site of team 7 and arrived to help Sakura. But here it wasn’t guaranteed that he’d meet with the explosive-note squirrel or want to help the Nara girl(assuming she was the one to wake up first from Orochimaru’s assault) like he did with Sakura. But team 7 had survived to the tower. So what had happened there? Especially if it was something that made _Rock Lee_ to quiet down.

“And you, Inuzuka-kun?” The Suna girl turned at Kiba. Akamaru woofed once and the boy stiffened for a moment but forcibly relaxed then.

“I don’t know. We trapped ours with some leeches. I don’t know if they’re still alive.” The boy shrugged. “What about you then?”

“…” Kairi sighed. “There was a Konoha team that attacked me. I took care of them and got the scroll. Another scroll I found from a Kusa team that got killed by a boar. Good thing that I got them both since Hara and Souseki lost ours to that Kabuto’s team.”

“They did? Why aren’t they here yet then?” Kiba frowned. The Suna girl shrugged.

“Maybe they lost each other or maybe their original scroll was taken before they ambushed the boys. Who knows?”

“Say, were you the one to talk to Gaara when he was about to… to…”

“To kill you after killing the Ame team? Yes. I wasn’t sure if he’d listen to me though but good thing that he did? I guess Temari-san could’ve talked him down too.”

“Thank you anyways.” Kiba said, bowing his head quite uncharacteristically. “I’m… grateful to be alive with Shino and Hinata.”

“It’s alright. Just a right thing to do. I live in the same village than Gaara, I’ve heard of him enough to reason with him.” Half-lie but contained the necessary information. Kairi smiled at the boy. Still so young and innocent. “But you are welcome anyways.”

* * *

On the fifth day the second phase finally ended, Kabuto’s team slinking in right in time. He and Kairi exchanged one very short glance before focusing to the front of the room where Hokage and the jounin instructors were standing with the proctors. All the teams were arranged into short ques facing the front of the room. The Oto team in the end hadn’t come at all and for some reason that made Kairi nervous. She glanced at the brunette Nara girl standing between her two team mates. She was the key. And either she hadn’t stopped Sasuke from killing the Oto team or had taken care of it herself somehow. Kairi didn’t know what to think about it.

“First of all…” Anko began. “Congratulations on finishing the Second Exam. Now pay attention. Hokage-sama is going to explain the Third Exam to you. You better listen carefully, maggots.”

“First, before I tell you what the Third Exam entails, I want to explain about the test itself. Why do you suppose our country holds these exams in conjunction with our allies?” The Hokage asked rhetorically. Kairi resisted the urge to roll her eyes. While interesting tidbit, it as something that wasn’t necessary to tell right now. People here were either exhausted or eager to fight. They didn’t want to hear babble about peace and replacement war. What a joke really. Replacement of war held between allies…

She didn’t really listen to the longwinded explanation, deciding rather to concentrate to the slight shifting of air currents in the room to see if there was anything to see. For example if Orochimaru was in the room. In canon he’d been disguised as Oto team’s jounin sensei but now… Maybe Kabuto’s team? But they wre a Konohan team so shouldn’t people know something is amiss. Unless the Sannin was using the man’s face and the sunglasses and face… veil? Scarf? Something like that anyways though Kairi really couldn’t see the Snake Sannin wearing something so absurd.

She snorted quietly at the thought. Even Kazekage’s robes were more fitting for him. Which reminded her… when was Kazekage going to be assassinated? Right before the finals? That sounded reasonable.

“This Exam is a chance for each nation to display the strength of its shinobi and thus the strength of the nation itself and it’s because its and Exam where your life is on the line that is had meaning. And it’s for this very reason and for the strength of the nation that your forerunners fought in this Exam. It’s truly a dream worth striving for.”

Right…

“Why did you say it was about ‘international friendship’ before, then?” Tenten demanded. Ah, what Kairi remembered and had seen of the girl, she was a peace-loving talented, kunoichi. The older girl couldn’t only hope that the Konohan wouldn’t be driven into corner where she’d have to make drastic decisions. Like what happened to Itachi. They were relatively around the same age even if Itachi had been a genius and in Anbu.

“This is a custom where balance is preserved by fighting and dying.” The leader of the village replied. “In the world of shinobi, that _is_ friendship.”

Bullshit. This was just a glorification of messed up values. A way to get potential chuunin vent out their frustrations in veiled showman ship and opportunity for the village leaders to thumb noses.

“The Third Exam is a fight for life, with the pride of your village and your own dreams at stake.”

Like Kairi just explained. She wanted to become a chuunin even if it was unlikely that it’d happen in these exams. Again, for reasons out of her control. But it still would be so nice to have her father’s name to use… Maybe if she gave good enough showing, like Shikamaru did in canon, she could get promoted… But with the Kazekage _not_ watching… So difficult.

“The test is fine. Just tell me what the details of the Exam are already. I can handle anything you throw at me.” Gaara rasped.

Whisper of wind and a ninja was kneeling in front of the Hokage after arriving by shushin.

“Hokage-sama, before you do, please allow me, Hayate Gekkou, proctor of the Third Exam to speak first.” The ninja said.

“So be it.” Hokage granted.

“It’s nice to meet you all.” Hayate spoke and coughed then. He turned around to address the genin gathered and damn, he looked tired. “There’s something I would like all of you to do before the Third Exam… We have to have a preliminary exam before we can move on to the real one. This is the first time in five years that there have been enough candidates finishing the Second Exam to require one.”

“Preliminaries?” Shikamaru asked in annoyance. “Just what do you mean by that?”

Idiot. Did he know nothing about chuunin exams and their finals? Granted he was a fresh genin but still… Chuunin Exam Final Tournament was always so big of an event that everyone noticed them. And there surely had been exams in Konoha too during the past years that the current generation would remember. Actually… wasn’t the exams five years ago requiring preliminary round also in Konoha? Tch, tch… So easy.

“The First and Second Exams might’ve been too easy.” Hayate explained. “The fact it, we never expected so many of you to still be here According to the rules of the Chunin Exams, a preliminary exam can be held at any stage in order to reduce the number of candidates remaining. It’s just that, as Hokage-sama said, a lot of important guests will be watching. We can’t afford to waste their time. They’ve come to see only the best. So if there are any of you that feel you are not in top physical condition, now’s your chance to bow out. The preliminaries will be determined by one-on-one combat and they will be starting immediately.”

Sneaky, to imply that the finals would be immediately after the preliminaries. Considering the hectic pace they’d bene led on thus far, it was necessary faulty assumption.

Kairi looked over the genin assembled. With the Oto team gone(?) but her team there, the amount of genin was the same than before. So technically the match ups would be relatively the same. Of course some changes there would be because she doubted her team would automatically replace the Oto team. Hara and Souseki against Shino and Chouji? Her against Shikamaru? Somehow Kairi doubted it’d happen.

“Okay, you got me. I’m out.” Kabuto raised his hand with a sheepish expression.

“Kabuto?” Naruto exclaimed. “What are you doing? You can’t quit now!”

“I’m sorry, but my body is just too beat up.” The medic apologized. “I just can’t hack it.”

“I’ll pass too.” Another hand rose up.

“Souseki!” Hara gaped. “Why? You got this far, if you give up now you end up like _her_.” The pointed finger in Kairi’s direction was definitely not appreciated.

“My arm is still broken from our fight in the forest and unfortunately I need both of my hands for my techniques. I severely doubt surviving a match and then the Third Exam right afterwards.” Souseki smiled at his friend. “I have complete faith in you for succeeding to make a spectacle.”

“You bet!”

“Anyone else?” Hayate asked. “Alright, Kabuto Yakushi and Souseki Nagaya, please leave the room. We will now begin the preliminary round.”

The pair left and the proctor continued explaining.

“There are 19 of you remaining, so we will need nine matches and one of you will gain free pass. The surviving candidates from these matches will move on to the Third Exam. As for the rules, there are none. You will fight until one of you dies or concedes defeat or is rendered physically incapable of continuing. Naturally, those who are losing, are encouraged to concede defeat to avoid fatal outcome. Furthermore, as a proctor, I’m given a certain amount of leeway in judging the matches. I might occasionally intervene if a match seems hopeless to save as many lives as possible.”

That’s… nice.

Please note the sarcasm.

Kairi couldn’t help but think about how the matches in canon could have ended if Hayate or anyone else hadn’t stepped in. Hinata, Lee… They both could be dead. Maybe Tenten and Chouji too if their opponents hadn’t deemed them ‘weak’ and ‘not worth the effort’. Though Hinata and Chouji were both clan heirs so they both were protected. Lee was alive only because Gai intervened. Tenten… she was a mystery. In some worlds (read: fanfictions) she was depicted as orphan, in some she had family…

“The names of each pair of opponents are chosen completely at random. Before each match, these names will appear on the display behind me. In a moment, the names of the first two opponents will appear.”

The display went through the names in ‘convincingly random’ manner until it stopped.

**_Sasuke Uchiha vs. Yoroi Akado_ **

“Everyone other than the two opposing canditates will now clear the area and move to the upper level.” Hayate requested.

The Suna shinobi and Misumi Tsurugi went to the left balcony. The Konoha Twelve went to the right balcony. Sasuke and Yoroi were left on the floor with Hayate.

“And begin!” Hayate gave a sign. Yoroi and Sasuke sprang into action but Kairi didn’t really concentrate on the fight. She rather observed the people on other balcony. Everyone was measuring each other. Tension was high, anticipating.

A match stick was waiting to be lit and make the cannon fire the start of war.

In a month the big day would be and Sasuke would light up the match and fire the cannon that was Gaara.

* * *

Sasuke won his match. Not surprising. What interested Kairi more, was the message being passed along among the jounin of the Konoha Twelve. The one who made the message and gave the first push was the Nara girl though. Hatake Kakashi’s student. Kairi still didn’t know her name. Maybe she’d finally find it out when it’d be displayed on the screen.

Sasuke and Kakashi left. Orochimaru in disguise followed them. Kairi’s shoulders relaxed fractionally and she leant her elbows against the railing.

**_Kankurou vs. Misumi Tsurugi_ **

Once again a predictable fight.

“Because his opponent is unable to continue, the winner is Kankurou.” Hayate announced. “The third match: Temari versus Tenten!”

This fight didn’t go quite as depicted in anime but Tenten still lost. Afterwards Kakashi returned. Kairi focused again to the conversation.

 _“Where’s Sasuke?”_ The Nara girl asked.

 _“Oh, he’s fine. Sleeping soundly in the infirmary. But he’s been put under guard by the ANBU. Although…”_ The copy-nin hesitated. _“When you were in the forest… did Sasuke… did he… you were attacked by a team of Sound ninja, weren’t you?”_

 _“Yeah, we were.”_ The girl replied.

_“Did Sasuke kill them?”_

So the Oto team _was_ dead. No wonder they weren’t at the tower then.

 _“No.”_ The Nara girl said. _“I did.”_

Wow. That was all Kairi could think as she looked up directly at the girl. She looked tired but determined. Nothing impressive outwardly but still… Kairi grinned.

 _“Show me the windmill you are making to turn, little deer. Show the ripples you are causing.”_ Then she had to blink. Didn’t Orochimaru use windmill as a metaphor when he explained to Sandaime Hokage why he was orchestrating the invasion? Damn… Was this creation of Kairi’s mind or an effect of having the Archive and thus making constant references to things having passed and going to pass?

The girl scowled and looked down on the arena right before the Nara girl could sense her gaze and meet it. Kairi didn’t fancy being suspected of anything just yet, thank you very much.

“Next match: Kiba Inuzuka versus Naruto Uzumaki!”

Kairi watched both boys leave the opposite balcony and noted with interest that Naruto was carrying a water canteen. What was he planning? The girl already had a feeling the fight was going to be different from canon.

“Sorry, Kiba. Don’t take it personally if I blow you away.” Naruto told his friend and opponent for the battle.

“That’s just what I was going to say! Only not so politely.” Kiba growled. “Right, Akamaru?”

“Woof!” The dog agreed. Cute dog but Kairi knew better than to go and pet him.

“When you’re ready…” Hayate glanced between the two boys. “Begin!”

Kiba started with the standard Inuzuka technique where he went down to four limbs and attacked with very fast taijutsu. It was accompanied by smoke bombs, intending to make it harder for Naruto to dodge.

When the smoke cleared, Naruto was lying on the ground and Kiba was standing. Until Akamaru went and bit his master.

“Surprise!” Naruto cried when releasing the henge. He backed off soon enough though.

“What? Where’s Akamaru?” The Inuzuka demanded. And the Naruto on the ground revealed the dog with him.

“Whaddya know?” Kiba grinned. “Got a little stronger, I see. But not nearly strong enough because now I’m going to get serious.”

“Good, I was hoping you would because I want to _seriously_ knock you out.” Naruto countered.

Akamaru was fed a soldier pill and after the transformation, the dog broke free from Naruto’s clone’s grip.

“Beast Human Clone! Fang over Fang!” And with the two techniques, the Inuzuka pair attacked. Naruto used kawarimi to dodge and…

“Hidden in the Mist jutsu!” Naruto called, whilst going through the seals. Kairi’s eyes widened.

 _“Where has he learnt that technique?”_ The girl thought in astonishment. _“It’s one of the staple jutsus taught at Kiri… And I doubt it’s something that Kakashi would’ve taught him. The only Kiri-nin Naruto should’ve been in contact with thus far is Momochi Zabuza but…”_

She was lacking information. Something had changed once again. Of course the Archive didn’t show everything that happened but it was still a good source material. Especially considering Kairi’s current ‘Spot-the-Difference’ game. And in canon the only three jutsus that Naruto regularly used where Kage Bunshin, Henge and the variations of Rasengan. The girl’s eyes flicked to the blonde’s female teammate. Maybe having someone smarter than Sakura (and of course the brunette girl was smarter – she was a Nara after all) was helpful for the team dynamics and development.

Several Naruto clones appeared all around the room with… wire? Yes, wire in their hands. The ninja wire was probably crisscrossing in the mist where Kiba still was.

“Alright! Eat this, Kiba!” Naruto jumped out of the mist. “Lightning Release: Radiating Shockwave!”

“…Wow.” Kairi blinked as the lightning sparked through the mist and presumably fried Kiba. That attack was surprising too. She felt giddy. Everything was so very interesting and somewhat _better_ too. She didn’t need to just watch thing go just like in canon but see differences too. It made everything seem more real.

“Kiba Inuzuka is unable to continue. Winner is Naruto Uzumaki.” Hayate announced and then called the next match, right away. “Shino Aburame versus Chouji Akimichi.”

That one was a tough match but eventually Shino emerged victorious.

“Next match will be Shikamaru Nara versus Shikako Nara.”

Okay… Kairi had to hold back a snicker. That girl’s name really was Shikako? Hilarious. And so unimaginative…

“I forfeit.” Shikako said, interrupting Kairi’s thoughts. Wait, what?

“What’s the point in that?” Temari scoffed next to Kairi. “Hanging in here to forfeit now?”

The Konohan shrugged. “There are two people in this room that I would forfeit rather than fight. My brother just happens to be one of them.”

Brother? So they were siblings after all? Were they even twins then? While it was hard to say when girls were at the cusp of their growth sport while the boys weren’t, the Nara girl was still shorter than her brother. It was possible that they were twins but it was also possible that she was a year younger. A year older and she probably would’ve been taller than her brother.

Kairi sighed. That didn’t matter in the end. The next match was called.

**_Hinata Hyuuga vs. Neji Hyuuga_ **

The Suna girl nodded the order of the names in amusement. Thus far in the rigged match-ups (and it was obvious that they were rigged one way or another) the expected winners had been announced first. Naruto had thus far been the only one to break the pattern. Meaning that it was interesting that Hinata was put first while Neji was known to be on the top of his class and a touted genius. Maybe it was main branch versus side branch bias then…

The fight was terribly one-sided and brutal. Hinata was lucky to be alive. And… Kairi did a quick count of the people left. Only five genin, one of which was going to get a free pass.

“Kairi Fuukatsu versus Jyari Hara.” Hayate read the names. Huh? This was the first (and only) match with the opponents coming from the same team.

“Finally.” Hara grunted and leaped over the railing to the arena. Kairi rolled her eyes and used the stairs. No reason for her to showboat.

The two Suna genin faced each other on the arena, Hara haughtily and Kairi with indifference.

“Are the contestants ready?” Hayate asked.

“Yes.” Kairi replied.

“Naturally.” Hara smirked. “I’ll end this in seconds.”

“You wish.” The girl said with narrowed eyes.

“And begin!”


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Preliminaries end, Kairi continues with her mission.

**Chapter 8.**   
  


“And begin!” Hayate lifted his hand up, metaphorically thus lifting the obstacle between the two Suna genin. Neither of them moved for a moment, assessing each other.

“So you do have some sense in you?” Kairi smirked faintly, her arms crossed on her chest.

“Tch.” Hara glared… and pounced. Kairi waited for the last moment before moving.

**“Soru.”  
(Shave)**

She disappeared from the sight, appearing to the other end of the arena, still smirking slightly.

 _“Now… humiliation or swift defeat…”_ The girl mused. _“Why not both?”_

“What was that technique? It was like Body Flicker but… not.” She heard someone from the Konoha side of the audience whisper. Of course no one from Suna would question it. Because it was something their own shinobi, Fuukatsu Kaito, had developed. And something Kairi had been taught even before she graduated from the Shinobi School. And something she had been watching her father to create and then help him to name.

(She might’ve taken the name from the Rokushiki technique from One Piece but sue her.)

“There’s something crucial you’re conveniently forgetting here though.” Kairi spoke up. “Something that was told to you when we became a team.”

“Like what?” Hara scoffed, making hand seals for some long-range wind-type technique.

“You’re forgetting just which one of us graduated a year before their peers _and_ on top of that graduating class.”

The wind technique hit the wall behind Kairi. She had Kogonhi in her hands, having cut the technique in half and thus directed the forces of the wind past her.

“You’re also forgetting that I was the one to collect two scrolls for our team at the forest. Granted one of them was salvaged from a team already dead but the other… Well, the water at the river must be undrinkable by now.” The girl shrugged and walked closer, the handle of her folding fan resting against her shoulder. “Meanwhile you… You and Souseki lost our original scroll to the enemy. So what does that tell you about our relative skill levels?”

“Shut up!” Hara charged at her, with the intent to knock her out with taijutsu. Kairi was ready for him. She twisted her fan and snapped it shut. She did not, however, fold the handle against it, thus now having a bastardized version of a baseball bat with her.

The blonde swung her weapon, catching the boy in the stomach and sending him flying.

 _“Homerun…”_ She thought idly. While having never played baseball, she had seen it enough in television in anime that she knew how tow swing a bat and what the terms in the game were.

Hara hit the wall.

“I may be just substituting in this team your dead team mate but you shouldn’t forget that I’ve gone through four other chuunin exams already. And survived them _alive_.”

This time it was Kairi taking the initiative. The fan was already folded and tucked away. Hara just barely came to meet the punch before using one-handseal kawarimi to dodge the next kick. Not bad. Kairi knew that Hara was a good shinobi for his rank and if he’d been pitted against one of the Konoha rookies he might’ve come out of the fight victorious. But he was stuck fighting Kairi. And she was well ahead of him in the terms or skill, experience, speed and strength.

They were in the middle of the arena again. Kairi slid into her ready stance. Fuukatsu style. While her mother’s ‘clan’ preferred using tessen-jutsu, they also did teach close-combat taijutsu. And her father in the other hand had been close-range fighter so he had taught a lot to her too.

 _Legacy_ was a heavy word. Something not really suitable for the situation either. Namikaze style, Legacy of the Namikazes were also entirely wrong. Because there was no common point for the brothers other than Elemental Nature and the same parents. They had different teachers, different villages, different values…

 _“Will I be strong enough to reclaim the name?”_ She thought when Hara attacked again. Dodge, block, swipe, kick, lean sideways, hit, block, hit the deck and give a swift kick to the head from an almost handstand.

She rolled away.

_“Even otou-san never did it. Not during wartime… Not during peace time…”_

It was time to end the fight. Hara was exhausted already and panting heavily.

**“Soru.”**

Kairi appeared above the boy, as high as the ceiling of the arena allowed, and with a spinning axe kick, made the boy hit the floor. He didn’t get up anymore.

“Jyari Hara is unable to continue. Winner is Kairi Fuukatsu!”

* * *

Gaara versus Lee was… painful to watch. Painful, impressive and interesting. Like watching a car accident as it occurred. Knowing the outcome and wanting to turn away but at the same time not able to.

 _“I wonder which one of us truly faster…”_ The girl mused once Lee got rid of his leg weights. During the laps around village neither of them had gone full speed and back then Lee had had his weights on while Kairi hadn’t augmented her speed with chakra, just used it to keep her going as her muscles warmed up.

And Lee managed to scratch Gaara.

“I honestly don’t know which one to root for.” Kairi grinned at the jinchuuriki’s siblings. “This is by far the most exiting match I’ve seen in chuunin exams.”

The outer Lotus was impressive but only served the anger Gaara. And the speed used for the technique…

_“It’s close to what I can do in a pinch but to which way the deviation is… That I can’t say. Probably eventually Lee will surpass me especially after he grows to his full height.”_

But the inner Lotus… It was plain scary. Even with only three gates open at first. Kairi had to stifle a gasp at the burst of chakra and the noticeable transformation that Lee went through. Then the fourth gate… And after the brutal attack on Gaara, the fifth gate.

Everyone was watching with wide and disbelieving eyes. Except for the Nara girl, Shikako. She watched in horror. But Kairi dismissed the girl in the favor of seeing the final outcome of the match. The Eight Gates was something she had been interested in to witness. After all by using all eight of them, Gai almost defeated Madara while the latter was in Rikudou-Sennin mode. Thought that was in the future currently.

 _“Well, that is definitely a speed I can’t match.”_ Kairi observed Lee’s performance. _“And with the price it comes, I glad I can’t.”_

Gaara survived the inner Lotus by turning his gourd into sand. And then proceeded in trying to kill Lee. That’s when Gai intervened. The only one who did. The only one who actually saw Lee’s worth and potential and who actually cared about the boy.

The youngest Sand Sibling seemed to have some sense knocked into him even if he couldn’t comprehend Gai’s reasoning to protect Lee. But thanks to that, the red head didn’t try to attack the both of them anymore and was declared the winner.

* * *

“And with that match, the Third Exam preliminaries are now finished.” Hayate announced, coughing and then calling the finalists back to the arena. Arena which was not completely and utterly destroyed by the previous fight.

Kairi glanced at the people assembled. The lineup was familiar but at the same time not.

“In the Third Exam you will all put your battle skills on display. You will demonstrate the power and control you have achieved in your respective disciplines. Accodingly, the Third Exam will be held one month from now on in order to provide a suitable period of preparation. So now, all that remains to be done is to find out who your opponents will be.” Hokage instructed them. When Anko went around with the box, Kairi let her thoughts wander.

She really didn’t like the idea of being on ‘display’. The thing about shinobi was to be covert. To hide and lie and conceal their true skills. And when the true skills came to play, hopefully there wouldn’t be anyone afterwards left to report them to the rival villages.

But at the same time she realized she had to do it in order to prove her worth and claim to her name. It was decreed so. Annoying but true.

Kairi drew her number. 9

Ibiki drew the tournament bracket.

_Naruto Uzumaki vs. Neji Hyuuga_

_Sasuke Uchiha vs. Gaara_

_Ino Yamanaka vs. Temari_

_Shino Aburame vs. Shikamaru Nara_

_Kairi Fuukatsu vs. Kankurou_

Familiar but not. And so obviously rigged too. Kairi was only surprised that they didn’t pit her and Temari against each other. But well, this way they still got a kunoichi only match and a suna-nin only match. The other matches… well, Naruto already swore revenge against Neji and Sasuke and Gaara had the most political clout due their lineages so the two were quite obvious matchups. Shino and Shikamaru in the other hand were probably just scraps. But they were both long-range fighters and clan heirs so they should be about equal in the terms of skills.

* * *

Kairi walked with Natsuhiko along the streets of Konoha. They’d stopped by the hotel where Kairi freshened up and were now on their way to eat dinner.

“We’re staying here for the month before finals, right?” She asked.

“Yes. Given the distance between our villages, it was decided between jounin senseis that there is no use to waste time by migrating between the two. Konoha agreed to the arrangement and graciously reserved two training fields for our use.” The man nodded.

“You gonna help me train or…?”

“I think you already know what to do. I, in the other hand, will go to deliver the tournament roster for Kazekage-sama and take with me the genin hopefuls that don’t want to stay to watch the finals. Sesamu is going with me.”

“Reasonable.” Kairi nodded. Getting weak genin out of the way while the stronger ones remained to be in position. And at the same time going to give the situation report to the higher ups.

“By the way, I heard you made a new friend.” Natsuhiko spoke up then.

“It doesn’t matter…” Kairi hedged a bit.

“No, no… I think it’s great. Expanding your sphere of support over the borders of our village.”

“That’s a bullshit reason and you know it. Especially when my ‘sphere of support’ already reaches Iwa.” The girl glared.

“Yes, yes… But really… Keep on going the way you have this far.”

In the other words… keep in contact with Kabuto and gather more information.

“I try.”

* * *

Okonomiyaki was delicious. And Natsuhiko paid for both of them. They didn’t talk much while eating but it didn’t bother either of them.

“Souseki-kun was looking for you.” The man mentioned when they were about to leave. “While you were in the shower, he ask me when it would be a good opportunity to meet with you.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That you’d be back at the hotel by six o’clock.”

Kairi glanced at the clock on the wall of the restaurant. It was quarter to six.

“I better get going then. See you later, sensei.”

“I won’t be around tonight much. But yes… We’ll see later.”

* * *

It turned out, Souseki had a message for her from Kabuto of all people. She was to meet him as soon as possible. Kairi blinked and calculated the known timeline. Kabuto and Baki should meet soon, maybe even tonight and because Hayate was tailing Kabuto…

“I don’t really get why you are befriending weird Konoha ninjas. Especially a weakling like him.” Souseki scoffed. “Though I guess the like attracts like.”

“May I remind you that you also forfeited before the prelimins?” The girl asked archly.

“Tch… I can’t wait to get out of here. Way too humid and annoying tree huggers everywhere.” The boy continued. Kairi ignored him.

“Natsuhiko-sensei is not around tonight, please go inform Baki-sensei that I’m meeting with my friend and will probably hang out with him until mid-night.” She stated then.

“And if he comes looking for you?” The Nagaya drawled.

“Kikyo Castle. It has a wonderful view with full moon on the background I’ve heard.” It was true. While running with Gai and Lee, Kairi had heard all sorts of random information about Konoha.

She turned to leave, trusting her temporary teammate to convey the message to the correct person. Souseki might be out of the loop but it didn’t diminish his usefulness for Kairi.

And thus the meeting time and place had been arranged.

* * *

“Kikyo Castle at midnight, huh?” Kabuto smiled. “Sounds appropriate. Are you going to stay around?”

“No. Whatever you agree to with Baki-sensei, I trust him to inform me of the appropriate parts of it when the time comes.” Kairi stated. They were sitting on the roof of one of the buildings near the Castle. The night was falling. “So… What have you been up to since you left the tower?”

“A bit this and that. Asked your team mate to arrange this meeting… Went to see that Uchiha kid in the hospital…”

“Were you caught? Since you’ve been tailed for a while.” Though why wasn’t Kabuto simply taken in… Maybe no one knew that Hayate was tailing the spy. And only Kakashi had confronted the younger man in his spy capacity when he tried to kill Sasuke in his hospital bed.

“Ah, yes… I blew my cover.” Kabuto laughed sheepishly. It was creepy simply because how _genuine_ the expression was. Like, whoops, my bad. Like it didn’t matter. And probably it didn’t. Being used by so many people – Danzou, Sasori, Orochimaru – and ultimately having loyalty only to himself, doing anything and everything to live and survive. Were the two of them really that similar? Kairi might not have as many people trying to control her but… she was a tool of her village too. And it didn’t matter to her either. She was only loyal to herself and the people she cared about, not the village itself. And definitely not to Kazekage.

“And your tail?” Hayate was good but Kairi had superhearing. Okay, wrong word once again. But she could hear better than most even without chakra.

“I’d appreciate if you’d keep him from getting any information.”

“…No killing required?”

“If you think you can keep him alive and preserve your cover afterwards.” Kabuto shrugged. “Doesn’t really concern me but it’d be annoying to try and find a new contact.”

“No worries. I can entertain him.” Kairi smirked. And with a silent signal, they both departed. Kabuto to the agreed meeting place with the clearest view of the both Kikyo Castle and the full moon behind it. Baki was already there, keeping an eye on Gaara who in turn was sitting on one of the fish shaped giant statues on top of the castle.

And Kairi landed directly in front of one Gekkoo Hayate, TokuJo and great skill in sword fighting. Twenty-three years old, dating Uzuki Yuugao. Graduated a year after nine-tails attack. Possibly in Anbu and… Had been killed by Baki when this same situation had happened in the original time-line.

“I’m sorry. But I really can’t allow you to proceed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm usein here a 'plot-hole' that Silver-Queen left behind when Shikako killed the Sound team. According to her it was because Dosu didn't challenge Gaara and get killed, Kabuto, Baki and Hayate would investigate it and that's why Hayate survived to judge the finals. I'm in the opinion that Baki and Kabuto would've met anyways (the scroll of the tactics was exchanged after all in the canon) and Hayate had been shadowing Kabuto for a while. So I have Kairi to step in here. Wait for hte next chapter to see what happened. ;)


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the end the most ninja is the ramen chef.

**Chapter 9.**  
  


”I’m sorry. But I really can’t allow you to proceed.” Kairi told her newly-found opponent. Hayate eyed her, measuring her up just like she did to him. He had seen her preliminary match against Hara. He has also probably seen that she hadn’t gone all out on the boy. Kairi in the other hand was running through more information on him in her head.

Could use shadow clones for his sword technique thus making it harder to dodge the attacks coming from three directions. Stats… Strength and Stamina were only 2 according to data books but it was given due his ill health. Ninjutsu in the other hand was 4 and other stats comfortably 3 or more.

Kairi took a deep breath as discreetly as she could, glad for the cover provided by the shadows the light of fullmoon cast. It would do no good to show weakness.

“Can’t allow me to pass? Why is that?” Hayate asked, his hand grasping the handle of his katana over his shoulder. Kairi crouched lower, ready to spring.

“Isn’t it obvious?” The girl asked. “Classified information.”

“You do realize that this is Konoha, and you are the one trampling the edge of rules laid on the guests?”

“You do realize that we are shinobi and flaunting the rules is something we are paid to do?”

He snorted. And then coughed. Kairi drew a slow breath…

With a clang of steel, they clashed. Sword against fan. Kairi blocked the overhead strike with the flat of Kogonhi, grimacing at the strain but nevertheless holding it.

“How did you spot me? I was ways away and concealed by a technique.”

Transparent Escape Technique, Kairi’s archive provided. She smirked.

“Maybe from eyes but not from ears.” She said, her right hand drawing a kunai while left arm braced against her fan. She aimed a stab at his stomach which made his jump away. Wise decision. After all Suna was known for their poisons.

“ _’Hayate’_ means ‘gale’ or ‘swift wind’…” Kairi mused, stowing away the kunai and flicking open her fan. “I wonder how that measures against Fuukatsu, ‘dividing wind’…”

Pause… Some shinobi fights consisted surprisingly much of posturing.

“Fuuton: Kinkazekiri no jutsu!” Kairi swung her fan and with the concealing wind currents, moved in for a close-range attack. A risky move considering that Hayate was a closer range fighter with a longer reach than her but… She had a trick up her sleeve.

“Leaf-Style: Dance of the Crescent Moon.” Hayate stated, moving out of the way of Kairi’s attack and forming two shadow clones to assist him. The girl cursed and brought her hands together in a singular seal.

**“Kazebunshin.”  
(Wind clone)**

Two wind clones intercepted the shadow clones and got dispersed, the erupting blades of wind killing Hayate’s clones in process too. Kairi in the other hand took the sword through her shoulder. She thanked the foresight of having an armor vest that blocked the worst damage for her shoulder but still couldn’t help but chuckle at the fact that the fight could very well follow the tracks of the original fight in the manga.

“Saa… I really don’t wanna know what it would’ve been like if those clones of yours had landed their hits too…” The girl mused, grimacing in pain when she shifted and the sword moved in the wound. With she dropped her fan and gripped the blade of the sword with her left hand. Hayate’s eyes widened a fractionally at the action.

“What are you-…?”

But during the moment of distraction, Kairi had already reached one of her hairsticks with her right hand was pulling it down with one smooth motion. She couldn’t do Kaze no Yaiba – Blade of Wind that Baki had pulled in this situation. That was an A-rank technique. But she could use her hairstick made of chakra conductive metal as a knife. And she rather used the hairstick than a kunai because of their positioning and easy reach.

She cut through the forest green vest of the TokuJo and pushed him away. Hayate collapsed on the roof, bleeding heavily but not as much as an A-rank wind technique at close range would’ve wounded him.

Kairi staggered and pulled the sword out of her shoulder. It stung. She needed a medic. But first she needed to get out of there.

 **“Soru.”** She vanished, only snatching up her fan before moving over the rooftops. Kabuto and Baki had already ended their meeting. It had been a quick one and over just moments before Hayate had landed his attack.

The blonde swayed and she had to crouch down on one of her landings. The blood loss was making her dizzy.

“That was quite the trick.” There had been no indication of her fellow spy landing behind her yet the sudden announcement of his presence hadn’t startled her.

“Yakushi-san…” Kairi breathed. Her left hand was staving the blood flow from her right shoulder while the right one hung limply on her side, just barely clutching onto Kogonhi. “Mind helping me?” She smiled tiredly. In some other world the blonde would’ve never even entertained the idea of asking Yakushi Kabuto’s help but here…

They weren’t friends. They were barely acquaintances and allies only because of their respective villages.

“Sure.” The silver-head smiled back his genuine-fake smile and helped Kairi to stand. With a burst of Body-Flicker, they were gone.

* * *

Kairi flexed her fixed shoulder. It was as good as new. Kabuto indeed knew what he was doing with his medical abilities. It was pity he was ultimately a bad guy and currently beyond saving. Damn Danzo. Damn Orochimaru. Damn the murderous villages ready to stab each other in the back.

“It should be completely healed by the time of the finals. Light exercise until then.” Kabuto told her, adjusting his glasses.

“Thank you.” The girl said sincerely. “Are you going underground now?”

“Yes. There is no real need for me here until the finals… And if there were, I wouldn’t tell you.”

Kairi chuckled.

“Hai, hai…”

“What about you then?”

“Konoha knows something is up. They probably knew it was happening even before you blew your own cover. It doesn’t cost them anything to let me walk free until the finals.” The girl mused. “I’m just one ninja, not even chuunin compared to all the chuunin and jounin waiting for the signal of attack on that day…”

“May I remind you that you held against a Specialist jounin on your own quite well not even an hour ago?”

“One with bad health.”

“Regardless true.”

“…Yeah. I wonder if I’ll get a field promotion soon for this.”

“Is that all you are thinking about?”

“…” Kairi glanced at the young man, considering her next words. “I want a promotion in order to reclaim my father’s name. I’m almost sixteen. And as much as I’ve learnt from my mother’s family, I’m much more my father’s daughter.” She hopped off the examination table she’d been sitting on. They were in some abandoned building at the outskirts of Konoha. In the woods but still within the walls. The building had been made into a secret laboratory slash medical bay. Thankfully any experiments were cleaned out a long time ago.

“See you later then.”

“Jaa ne.”

Kairi left the place. It was weird how easy it was to talk with Kabuto. Almost as if they were friends even when they weren’t. About as easy to talk to as Koto and Yomi.

The girl sighed. The next four weeks would be so long.

* * *

Next morning, Kairi returned to the hotel under the pretense of returning from her early morning run. In the lobby she ran into Natsuhiko-sensei who was writing a list of genin returning with him to Suna.

“Both Hara and Nagaya are going back?” Kairi asked in surprise when she glanced at the list.

“These are only their second exams.” Meaning that they were too young, weak and inexperienced to participate in the invasion so they were being sent back for the future of the village.

“I see. Good. One less of a headache for me then.” The girl nodded.

“If you need to ask anything, Baki-san will be able to help you.”

“Understood.”

With a wave, Natsuhiko left the lobby to meet up with Sesamu-san who was going back to Suna too and to gather the genin going back. There wasn’t much as there hadn’t been many Suna teams at Konoha in the first place.

Actually… Now that Kairi thought about the list she’d seen, it seemed that only the finalists (i.e. the Sand Siblings and her) plus some of the jounin were remaining behind. All other eleven genin would be taken back home.

Good, the invasion would have no room for cannon fodder and anyone who wasn’t informed of it beforehand and completing their tasks, would be a security risk if the debrief were to happen at this point of time.

That being said, Kairi could only hope that she’d survive the ordeal with both her body and sanity intact.

“Let’s just stay positive…” She muttered, heading for her room to get a shower and change of clothes. It was almost breakfast time anyways. Two hours from sunrise and all.

* * *

There was one training ground set aside for the Sunan shinobi. And that’s where Kairi spent her mornings. Sometimes simply tree climbing and jumping, sometimes practicing her tessen-jutsu. There wasn’t much that she could do with the possibility of the Konohan shinobi spying on her now that she was a known and active factor against them and not just a chuunin exam participant.

Kairi landed neatly on the ground from the standing backflip and sighed. She was honestly bored. She no one to train with either. No Koto-kun or Yomi-chan… No Natsuhiko-sensei. Not even her mother who was back at Suna. And frankly Kairi wasn’t interested in striking up a conversation with Temari or Kankuro. Not to mention that she really didn’t want to train with Kankuro and his puppet Karasu which was probably currently being outfitted with new weapons and poisons. Nope, nope, nope…

Her stomach grumbled. Kairi sighed again.

“I want ramen.”

* * *

Teuchi-san greeted her cheerily and started a conversation whilst preparing her shoyu-ramen bowl. Ayame was there too, serving some other customers.

“Ah, Fuukatsu-san, long time so see. How are you?”

“I’m good, Teuchi-san. Preparing for the finals. Never really believed I’d make it that far.” Kairi smiled back. “How about you? Business booming as ususal?”

“Ah, steady trickle of regulars with a couple of strays like you.” The man laughed.

“Stray? I’d be offended if it weren’t so accurate of a statement.” Kairi smiled back.

“And as congratulations for making to the finals, the first bowl will be on the house.”

“Arigatou!” And she dug into the bowl placed before her. “Delicious as always!”

She was enjoying her dish and barely even noticed when the Konoha’s number one unpredictable ninja took a seat a couple of stools over and gave an exuberant greeting to Teuchi. And when his female teammate joined him.

“Hey, Naruto!” Nara Shikako greeted the boy. “How’s training?”

“Ehehe, Shikako! I didn’t see you there.” The orange-clad boy smiled and shrugged then in response to the girl’s question. “It’s going okay. I mean, the toads are cool and all but the pervy sage just keeps wanting me to draw on – I mean, use more chakra and stuff. And Ebisu-sensei is boring, but I can tell I’m improving. And boy was he surprised when I asked for more chakra control techniques.”

Kairi paused her eating, considering the information offered. It seemed that Ebisu had stayed as Naruto’s teacher this time around despite Jiraiya’s appearance. And Naruto seemed to tolerate him too. The building blocks for canon were still in place though, with Naruto trying to learn summoning and apparently Jiraiya trying to get him to use Nine-Tail’s chakra. If the cut-off sentence indicated anything of substance that was.

“I bet he was.” Shikako laughed. “So is this the real you? Not a clone?”

“Of course! Clones don’t need to eat.”

“I know. But I wouldn’t put it past some of _your_ clones to sneak off to eat ramen.” The Nara girl smirked before handing over an envelope to the boy. “Here. These are for your fight. You should probably go over the information with Ebisu-sensei. Just be careful on there that you don’t just _anybody_ getting their hands on.”

Kairi tried very hard not to snort at the statement, seeing as she was sitting just behind the girl. But then, she was wearing her ‘civilian-esque’ clothes once more and had her hitai-ate hanging from her belt on the side away from the two Konohan genin.

“Hey, these are like Kabuto’s Nin-Info Cards!”

“It is not! It’s detailed report on your opponents’ skills, strengths and weaknesses with potential strategies to take advantage of them. It’s nothing like-…”

Kairi resumed eating so she would seem like she was listening in. Considering that the rest of the current clientele at the ramen stall were civilians, she doubted they’d pay attention to her but better safe than sorry. But seriously though, what did that rookie genin have against Kabuto? The Nara girl had been weird during the first phase too but…

“Okay, okay, sorry! It’s great. Thanks!”

“And here I was going to tell you about this awesome new idea that I had about your shadow clones… I guess you don’t want to hear it.”

“No wait! Yes, I do! Please tell me!”

“Oh, alright. Are you free for a bit? Or send a clone with me.”

“I’ll come. What is it? Is it a super cool move that’ll help me defeat Neji?”

“It might be. It’s just an idea. We’ll have to see how it works…”

After Naruto had eaten, he and Shikako headed out. Kairi ordered another bowl of ramen, this time miso-ramen. While eating it, she let her thoughts dwell. Listening to the interractions of those two preteens, Kairi felt like she could pinpoint what exactly was causing the change in Naruto when it came to Nara Shikako.

Shikako was calm and could curb Naruto’s more volatile nature. And considering how well she interacted with the boy, she probably had known him at the Academy too. And if they’d been friends even back then, she very well could’ve been a buffer between the boy and some meaner kids. And through her brother introduced other kids of their class to the blonde jinchuuriki. At least that would explain how the meeting between the rookies had been good-natured ribbing instead of a verbal attacks flying between alpha-males.

It was the same with Sasuke too. He wasn’t an arrogant recluse but much mellower than his counter-part from canon.

Nara Shikako’s mature approach bound the team together much better than Sakura’s aggressive behavior.

Kairi let out a fond smile on her face while glancing at the seats the two had occupied. Only the clank coming from the new bowl woke her up. She looked up at Teuchi’s gentle face.

“Relatives are a wonderful thing, aren’t they?” The ramen cook smiled at her. Her surprise must’ve been visible when the man chuckled and continued with a lower pitch. “The resemblance between the two of you is obvious for anyone that’s bothering to look for it. But as you are from other village, I doubt many people will see it. And they call themselves the master spies.”

“T-Teuchi-san…” Kairi began but stopped. What could she say? While it seemed like Teuchi wouldn’t go telling anyone, she couldn’t be sure.

“Your secret is safe with me. I hope you’ll someday speak to Naruto-kun about it.”

“Someday.” Kairi agreed. “But not for a while… We both need to be stronger for that.”

“May I ask how you are related?”

“Cousins. Our fathers were brothers. And they had another brother in Iwagakure so we have two cousins there too.” The girl smiled. “Reika-nee and Dei-kun are great and so is Arashi-jisan.”

“It’s great to hear that Naruto-kun has family left. Even if it’s outside the village walls.” Teuchi nodded.

“And it’s great to see he is building a family here through his friends.” Kairi added.

“Very true.”


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meeting a lot of people.

**Chapter 10.**

Kairi inspected the ‘Get Well’-cards sold at a little papershop near the hospital. None of them appealed to her. Either they were too ‘artistry’, meaning confusing and messy, or then they were too ‘formal’, meaning boring and dull. None of them fit Lee. While there could’ve been good and colorful cards at the shop too, they looked too massproducted.

“You leave me no choice then… I’ll make my own.” Kairi muttered and swept to the other part of the shop which had art supplies. Purchasing a set of coloring pencils and some cardboard, she set out to find something specific she’d had in her mind ever since she set her foot in Konoha.

* * *

“Konnichiwa, Lee-kun.” Kairi greeted the boy, when she stepped into his hospital room. It was mid-morning and the visiting hours had just opened.

“Ah, konnichiwa, Kairi-san.” The boy greeted back but his smile lacked his usual enthusiasm.

“How are you?” She asked, taking a seat on the chair by the boy’s bedside. Lee looked aside, avoiding her gaze.

“They say… They say I might not be able to continue as a ninja.” The boy said sadly. Kairi glanced at the array of flowers and gifts on the table before looking back at him.

“I’m not surprised by that. Just surviving alive against Gaara is a miracle.” She sighed but didn’t elaborate. Considering how many Suna-nin had been sacrificed in order to either assassinate or control the boy and Shukaku, the fact that Lee was alive was, indeed, a miracle. Even without Gai’s interference. “But that doesn’t mean you should stop.”

“Huh?” Lee looked up, unshed tear brimming in his eyes and surprise on his face.

“Take a step back and recuperate. But don’t stop. You are amazing person and a great shinobi. Just don’t give up on getting better even if it might take time, okay?” There was Tsunade after all. And Kairi didn’t see any reason why Jiraiya wouldn’t go looking for her after the invasion. Sarutobi’s death was basically given due his age and the fact he’d be going against Orochimaru and two resurrected Hokage’s.

“O-Okay…” A wobbly smile. Tears, hastily wiped with a bandaged forearm.

“Here.” Kairi took the card she’d drawn out of her pocket and unfolded it. It was a scenery of Konoha’s rooftops as seen from on top of the Hokage Monument, sight she, Lee and Gai had seen during their morning runs. Kairi has stayed up on the cliffs for hours in order to immortalize the view, gone to sleep and then woken up early to add just the right amount of sunlight and shadows into the picture, to match their view.

She placed the picture on Lee’s lap and got up from her chair.

“Don’t stop, Lee-kun.”

* * *

“Kairi-san, we haven’t seen in a while. How have you been?” Gai’s sudden appearance and friendly greeting came out of left field.

“Gai-san.” The girl nodded back, a bit baffled about the situation but trying her best not to show it. “I’ve been fine, thank you for asking. And you?”

“Alright. Visiting Lee and helping my village with the security for the up-coming finals.” Very straight-forward yet round-about. Just like Kairi expected really. And whatever Gai wanted from this meeting, it would serve at least two purposes. She wouldn’t delude herself into thinking that her friend(?) wouldn’t be keeping an eye on her.

After all, according to canon, Hayate’s body had been found on the very next day from his fight with Baki and an emergency meeting had been held between Hokage and the jounin and TokuJo soon after that. Since it had been almost a week since Kairi’s fight with Hayate and the man had been conscious when she had left, he could’ve very well summoned help and told who exactly it was that attacked him.

“Have you kept up with your training?” Gai asked then. Small-talk? That she could do.

“Ah well… I’ve spent this week cooling down from the second phase but I intend on picking up the pace soon.” Pause. “Ah, umm… I sort of thought about asking this before but considering how worried you were about Lee-kun, I ended up pushing back… But would it be okay if we went on our morning runs again? I’ve sort of missed them…” Kairi asked awkwardly, tugging her braid with one hand.

“I don’t see why not! One needs to keep up with their training regardless of the situation. On their own pace of course.” Gai grinned, giving her a thumbs-up. Kairi smiled.

“Thank you, Gai-san!”

“No. Thank _you_.”

And Kairi knew. Despite her being an enemy. Despite her going to be fighting against Konoha at May 20th… Gai was pulling double-duty with this. He was paying her back for cheering up Lee. And he was fulfilling his duty to his village by keeping an eye on her and gathering information on her intentions.

But it was alright.

* * *

It had been completely accidental. Kairi had been wandering around Konoha after lunch (Korean-style barbeque at one of the restaurants owned by Akimichi) during the third week of break. Actually… It was exactly a week before the Final Tournament.

Nevetheless, she had been wandering around, staying away from the civilian districts and already occupied training grounds when she’d seen it. The mane of spiky long white hair. Red and green clothes accompanied by a giant scroll on his back. Geta-sandals clacking against the cobblestones…

Jiraiya of the Sannin.

Kairi wasn’t ashamed to say that she froze. It wasn’t exactly crowded area but it wasn’t anywhere near spacious either. One of the market streets but the tall and frankly _large_ man was easily spotted.

And he spotted Kairi too. Or at least sensed her stare and was about to turn around (safe for him due the shops attracting attention and the fact he was one of the strongest ninjas Konoha had ever produced) when Kairi made her hasty escape. Speed was her strength along with subtlety. And Soru was much subtler than Shunshin. It relied more on natural speed with the addition of chakra and was thus less like teleporting that left after images and chakra-prints (along with leaves/sand/water).

Of course that was also her mistake. After all, Jiraiya had trained Namikaze Minato. The Yellow-Flash who was had been about the fastest shinobi in the world during his life-time even without the Flying Thunder God Technique. So of course Jiraiya had have ways to keep up with his student somehow. (No matter how miraculous or prodigious the Yondaime Hokage had been, he didn’t become a kage-level shinobi overnight.)

Thus tracking her route and intercepting her in more deserted area was probably child’s play for the man.

Kairi sensed the man before seeing him. But instead of stopping immediately or continuing to the direction she’d chosen (and risked the possibility of being physically caught), she took a step to the left and stopped then.

There was a ten-meter distance between them on an empty training field. Kairi was slightly crouched, still ready to flee but she was no way out of breath. Jiraiya was standing straight, his arms crossed on his chest and giving an assessing look on her.

The silence was uncomfortable but Kairi had no intention of breaking it.

“Interesting technique. I’ve only seen one other shinobi utilizing it.” The sannin decided to say then. Kairi blinked but didn’t reply. “Fuukatsu Kaito was his name.”

A little surprised sound escaped Kairi’s throat.

“It was years ago though. And as I never witnessed any other Sand-nin using it but sticking to Body-Flicker, I thought maybe it was something unique to him.”

“Fuukatsu Kaito died four years ago. He was my father.” Kairi stated. “And this is a technique that he created.” _In order to honor his youngest brother._ But she didn’t mention that.

“Oh? Is that so?” The sage grinned. But there was sharpness there. Kairi narrowed her eyes but straightened up and tried to relax. The still running adrenaline didn’t help the matters though.

* * *

What Kairi didn’t know though, was that Jiraiya had been the one to bring Minato Konoha. That Jiraiya had met Namikaze Shizue and could recognize her features on the girl. The blond color of hair had come from her even if Minato had inherited Namikaze Kishi’s spikes. The shape of her eyes was the one found on her sons and granddaughter even when Kairi was the one with her green through Kaito, and Minato and Arashi had gotten the blue from Kishi.

So Jiraiya knew exactly who this girl was. Through the stories he heard from a dying woman and what little he’d heard from Kaito himself and now by the girl’s own admission. He knew whom Kairi was related to but that didn’t give her any leeway in the situation. She was from Suna after all. And Jiraiya knew she would be staying in Konoha only for one purpose, otherwise she wouldn’t have been sent into the exams at all given her record. While it saddened him that Minato’s niece would be the enemy within a week’s time, the eternal idealist and optimist in him refused to believe the worst of the girl.

“Yes.” The girl replied tersely, still wound-up like a spring despite her attempts to relax. Jiraiya chuckled.

“Maa, relax will ya? I’m not trying anything here.”

The girl tilted her head but didn’t reply. She was truly an unknown quantity. Jiraiya had no idea how much she knew about her own family, given that her father was dead and had been for years according to her. He very much doubted that the girl knew about Naruto considering the secrecy around the boy’s birth and later in life. And as she was an outsider and a foreign kunoichi to boot, she had no right to those secrets either, related by blood or not.

So Jiraiya wouldn’t be telling her anything. But he would very much enjoy unravelling the information that she did know. Well, if only he had the time to do so. But no, he probably should return to Naruto now and oversee his training. That Shikako-girl could give hints and see that the boy didn’t do anything stupid but a responsible adult was sometimes needed too.

* * *

Kairi really didn’t know what to make of Jiraiya. The shinobi from Konoha were so weird. They were weird on paper and even weirder in real life.

“How did you meet my father?” She opted to ask instead.

“We met in Grass. Near Fire Country’s border. Afterwards got ambushed by some shinobi from Hidden Rock which was when I saw that technique you so nicely demonstrated.”

Kairi bristled at the off-hand way Jiraiya addressed her father’s creation.

“It’s called Soru.” She retorted dryly, trying not to show the real extent of her irritation. And yes, she remembered her father mention an ‘interesting acquaintance’ after coming back from that mission. And then, after a month or so, he’d gone on a routine patrol to the border between Kaze no Kuni and Ame and never come back.

“A good name.” Jiraiya nodded thoughtfully. “Short, compact, to the point.” And considering the ways Minato named his techniques… Yeah.

“I came up with it.”

This time Jiraiya was the one to blink. Kairi crossed her arms defensively.

“I’ve considered renaming it Shunpo, though.” Bleach was an awesome manga too and frankly, the way Soru was currently, it was much closer in execution to Shunpo than to original Soru from One Piece.

“Not a bad name either. If you can own up to the name and make the technique your own instead of something you learnt from your father…”

Was Jiraiya the Sannin giving her advice/compliment? Bhuh, so weird… But he was right too. Soru hadn’t been quite finished when Kaito had died. He’d never tried to push it to its limits to see how far he could go with it. Speed and maneuverability-wise. But Kairi could do that.

“Not a bad idea.” Kairi agreed slowly. “Thank you very much, Jiraiya-sama.” The honorific was tacked on just for respect Kairi had for the man for being Minato’s teacher.

Then she escaped the situation. Just because she could. And because she really didn’t want to be in the presence of the spymaster for much longer. Nevermind that information and infiltration were her specialties, Jiraiya was a master in the craft.

* * *

The day before the tournament dawned bright and early. Natsuhiko-sensei had arrived from Suna and was conferring with Baki-sensei quietly under a privacy seal. While Konoha might’ve been the best in fuuijutsu due their connection to fallen Uzushio, it didn’t mean that other countries were completely deprived of sealing knowledge. Even if Chiyo’s attempt at sealing Shukaku to Gaara was questionable at best and extremely hazardous at worst. When Kairi stepped into the bubble and greeted the two jounin, her temporary sensei looked up.

“Ah, Kairi-chan.” Natsuhiko smiled. “Could you please get your fellow finalists here? We have some last minute information about the plan to them.”

“Of course. I trust your trip home was fruitful.” Kairi replied.

“Very. Kazekage-sama was pleased with our progress at this stage.” The man said. “Have you been keeping up with your training?”

“Without a hitch.”

“Good.”

“Temari and Kankuro should be at the training ground already.” Baki stated. “I’m not too sure about Gaara’s current location.”

“I’ll look for him too.” Kairi merely said and left. She’d first go to the two oldest of Kazekage’s children and then go look for the youngest. Though…

* * *

Finding and sending Temari and Kankuro back to the hotel went fine. Without a hitch really… Gaara though…

“Wasn’t this the day…” Kairi frowned before her eyes widened and breath constricted in her throat. “Lee-kun…”

She began running. While she hadn’t really seen Gaara for the past few days, she had occasionally felt his chakra fluctuate in a manner that she could only describe as ‘confused’ or even ‘disturbed’. Kairi didn’t have a great sensing range, she was nowhere near being classified as a sensor, but at closer range she could gauge strength-levels and stronger emotions. It was something that almost any shinobi could do. Probably.

Kairi neared the hospital and she could sense Gaara in there, in the same floor that Lee’s room. She only slowed down in order not to disturb and scare the staff and thus get the Anbu jump on her. But while heading upstairs she could feel the jinchuuriki’s chakra jump in agitation. Kairi gritted her teeth. And as she neared the room, she could feel other signatures. Gaara’s loudness had almost covered them completely (at least to her).

She stopped right outside the door but didn’t enter. She listened. Three voices in addition to Gaara’s. Lee was asleep. His signature was faint was steady.

But three voices… Naruto and the Nara twins. The twins had used shadow jutsu on Gaara. Naruto was shouting. Why didn’t any of the hospital staff notice any of this? How had Gaara even entered the hospital? When Kairi had visited Lee for the first time, she had to be subjected under scrutinizing questioning as she was from Suna. And it was only on the following times she’d gotten in straight away because Gai, as Lee’s guardian and jounin of the village, had given her the okay.

The conversation turned to demons. And Kazekage’s stupid decisions. Kairi didn’t move. Didn’t say anything. At all. At the Forest of Death she had had the higher ground, thus she’d dared to oppose Gaara directly and his bloodlust had been sated by the dead Ame-team. Now though… The situation was wholly different.

So she just listened Gaara to talk. While Kairi knew all of it through her Archive and past memories, the amount of knowledge given her directly in this life was limited. So by listening here the truths straight from the source… Well. if she later showed some unusual knowledge about this particular subject, at least she had a reason and source for it.

“Now! Let me feel alive!”

Then the tanuki-boy’s chakra surged. Kairi’s head snapped up. She _had_ to move. _Had_ to do something.

“Gaara, that’s enough!” She stepped into the room. the sand was swirling in the air. Emotions wouldn’t work on Gaara given his mental state. Logic, logic, logic…

“Why should I listen to you, Kairi?” Came the emotionless reply. Nearby, sand twisted in a threatening manner. Kairi swallowed, determined not to show her fear and apprehension. She didn’t look at the Konoha-genin in the room, instead she looked Gaara directly in the eye.

“Baki-sensei sent me to get you. He has a message from your father.” It was stretching a bit but specified orders counted as a message, right? Kairi let out a sigh. “Let these kids and Lee-kun be. You’ll get your share of excitement tomorrow. Your first match will be against that Uchiha boy, maybe he’ll give you an actual challenge at the arena then.” Distract, distract…

If Naruto and Shikako stiffened at the mention of their teammate, Kairi ignored it.

“Your quarrel with Lee is over. There is no reason for you to be here. Besides, don’t you prove your existence with the blood of people who are trying to end it? These kids have done nothing of the sort to you. You don’t need their blood and lives here and now.”

“She is right.” A new voice said. Gai. Finally. “Save this all to final competition. You’re just wasting it today, is that what you want?”

And the sand retreated. Kairi wanted to slump against the doorframe but didn’t want to show weakness. _Couldn’t_ show weakness really. Not yet. Not in front of Gaara.

“All the same, I will kill you. Just you wait. I’ll kill you all.” The red-haired boy muttered when retreating from the room, Gai’s appearance having caused a flashback to the preliminaries and unsettling him again. Kairi really didn’t envy Baki and Natsuhiko for having to deal with the boy afterwards.

Gai began talking to the Konoha-genin then and Kairi decided to take the opportunity to leave as well. Natsuhiko probably would have some additional instructions for her too.

“Kairi-chan.” Gai spoke up. She glanced over her shoulder and quirked an eyebrow. “Thank you.”

Kairi blinked and looked away then.

“Tomorrow is the big day, I suggest to get some last-minute training.” She said. When glancing back at the Konoha-nin she gave a wry smile. “A lot of excitement planned considering the tournament roster. Not exactly how I planned on spending my sixteenth birthday really.”

And she left the room.

* * *

“Gai-sensei? You know her?” Shikako asked tentatively once the Sand kunoichi had left.

“Yes. We go together on morning runs. She is a good girl.” The jounin replied. “Gave Lee a Get Well-card.”

Shikako gave baffled blink.

“Man, having a birthday and tournament on the same day.” Naruto mused. “I don’t know if I should be jealous or not.”

“Well, if she gets a promotion, she just gives herself an impressive birthday present.” Shikamaru stated. “Let’s go see Chouji now.”

The genin left the room. Gai gazed at his student, still sleeping on the bed, and let his gaze drift to the drawing propped up on the bedside table. It was a sunrise that was coloring the buildings. Not sunset even though it would’ve been easier and faster for Kairi to color it as so instead of going twice to the Hokage Monument. And that told Gai just what Kairi thought about the entire invasion the Sand and Sound were planning.

She didn’t think Konoha deserved to have her days ended.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The third phase. And invasion begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was unfinished in my files so I decided to woman up and finish it. Please enjoy.

**Chapter 11.**

Kairi tied her hair on a high ponytail to mimic the style her father used.  The sidelocks were hanging free once more. After sticking the hairsticks in place and tying her hitai-ate, she began checking her weapons. While she might’ve used them sparingly during the second phase and it was likely that Kankuro would forfeit his match if it came to it, the fact still remained that the invasion would be a full war in miniature scale and she would need everything she had on her.

Luckily, Natsuhiko-sensei had given her a package from her mother full of tiny kunai. They were shorter and narrower than standard ones and had grooves on the both sides of the blade to speed up bleeding even when the kunai was still stuck in the wound. They would definitely be handy. Especially when they were stored in a pair of seals that she attached inside her otherwise full weapon pouch.

Then there was a couple of color-coded explosives with triggers in a separate bag. Reika had stopped by in Suna and left them with Akane.

“Smoke bombs… Brimstone triggered firebombs… plain explosives…” They would become handy for distraction and sabotage. One of the many things she needed to do. Kairi took the last package of the delivery and opened it. Huffed an amused laugh.

“What is it?” Temari asked.

“Okaa-san sent me onigiri without seaweed… with gari-filling. My favourite.” Considering that it was nearly impossible to get seaweed in the middle of desert, it wasn’t that much of a surprise that any onirigi made would be without it.

“Gari? Pickled ginger?” The other blonde stared.

“Yep. I don’t care for umeboshi and well… I’ve never seen tuna in Suna so… Not much choices left. And gari is so good.” Kairi grinned and began eating the makeshift breakfast.

“Why am I even surprised…” Temari muttered, packing her things. Their belongings would be sent back to Suna before the finals even started in the case Konoha would have an opportunity to sneak about. Kairi thought it a wonderful idea. As she knew that the invasion would go to south, she totally agreed on getting her belongings out before it.

“Hey, Temari…

“Hm?”

“Good luck on the tournament.”

“You too…”

* * *

 

Kairi stopped by the memorial stone and bowed to it.

 _“Please forgive me, Minato-jisan, Kushina-basan, for what I’m going to do for your village.”_ She thought(prayed) and straightened up. She drew a deep breath before heading to the arena.

It was showtime.

* * *

They were standing down at the arena (with Sasuke missing), looking up at the audience and waiting for the Hokage to give his welcome speech to the nobles gathered. Kazekage and his two guards had already arrived to the Kage Box. Or rather, Orochimaru and his disguised Oto no Yun were up there. Kairi glanced to the side at Hayate who was the tournament proctor here too. Apparently, he’d healed quite well from their fight.

So had Kairi.

 ** _“Welcome all!”_** Hokage’s voice boomed. ** _“And our deepest thanks for coming here to the Village Hidden in the Leaves for our Chuunin Exams. We will now start the main tournament matches between the ten participants who made is through the preliminaries. Please stay and watch until the end!”_**

Hayate turned to address the chuunin-hopefuls. His gaze stopped on Kairi for a second but no one seemed to notice.

 ** _“Alright.”_** The TokuJo coughed, his voice reaching the stands easily too. **_“The terrain is different but the rules are the same. Naruto Uzumaki and Neji Hyuuga have the first match. Those two stay, and the rest of you can go to the waiting area.”_**

The seven of them left, leaving the two competitors and the judge on the arena.

* * *

Kairi settled on leaning against the railing next to Kankuro and Temari. The match was going on below them. It was… different. Good but different. Kairi honestly wasn’t surprised anymore at this point. Naruto was doing great.

“Nee, Kankuro…” She began.

“Huh? Yeah?” The boy looked up at her from the match.

“In the case that the rumors hold true and Uchiha Sasuke will arrive late… Will you give me a good showing of a fight?”

“But it wouldn’t happen, right? With everything going to happen…” The face-paint boy spoke.

“Considering the political value of both the Last Uchiha and your little brother, it’s more than likely that the match will be delayed rather than cancelled for the sake of the paying audience.” Kairi explained. “Thus… If we are to have our match, I won’t allow you to just quit. If we have to have an exhibition match without going all in, so be it. I can grant you a relatively quick knockdown in that case. But I want my match!” She glared.

“Hey, why would you? And what makes you think you can beat me anyways?” Kankuro glared straight back with Temari watching between them.

“Because you owe me, for the Forest of Death. Because this is the last time I’m sent to international chuunin exams. Because I graduated two years prior to you and thus have more experience. Because the Plan might become a huge clusterfuck in the end. Take your pick, but don’t you dare forfeit!” Kairi hissed.

On the background people were cheering and clapping for Naruto’s win. Kankuro remained silent for a moment. then he nodded.

“Fine, but if you get stung by my poisons, it’s your own fault.”

“No worries about that.”

Down at the arena, someone was carrying a message to Hayate. Was that Raidou?

Temari scoffed at the situation but descended on the arena on her fan, accompanied by a blast of wind. She was quite cool.

**_“Match two: Ino Yamanaka versus Temari. Begin!”_ **

This match would be interesting.

* * *

And it was. Ino used ninjawire and explosive tags. Even some poison. She forced Temari even use _Kirikiri Mai_! Kairi stared down at the arena. Konoha’s rookies were scary.  As Ino had gotten to the finals with a freebie, Kairi hadn’t expected much, but the younger girl had definitely trained a lot and could give a good showing. Even when Temari was losing her temper with the evasion tactics used, Kairi could sense a pattern there.

And the plan could’ve worked. If the fan had been the only way to produce the wind techniques that was.

 ** _“Ino Yamanaka is unconscious and unable to continue.”_** Hayate announced.

* * *

Kairi shuffled her cards. She hadn’t even noticed that she’d packed them to her weapons’ pouch. Oh well, they didn’t take much space and could be used as projectiles in a pinch. Like Wing from HunterxHunter had used a normal sheet of paper when demonstrating the usage of Nen to strengthen normal object and cut a soda can in half with the paper. And she was a kunoichi. She could use anything she had as a weapon.

Down in the arena Shino and Shikamaru were fighting. It was interesting. Insects and shadows, water and usage of the conditions left by the previous competitors… Shikamaru was definitely using his sister’s apparent sealing expertise to help himself. And utilizing Ino’s ninjawires too. He won his match.

Naturally.

It was Kairi’s turn now. She jumped over the railing and landed down after a somersault. Kankuro used the stairs. He wasn’t forfeiting (yet). Good.

* * *

**_“Match four: Kankuro versus Kairi Fuukatsu. Begin!”_ **

Kankuro unraveled Karasu. Kairi flipped open her fan. She ducked under the first assault of the puppet and blocked the second attempt with her fan. As long as she didn’t force Kankuro to use more complicated maneuvers, it was all good. Of course, she couldn’t let him win either. Getting poisoned was not fun and if she were detained to the infirmary, Konoha could easily arrest her there and prevent her from completing her mission.

“Kinkazekiri no jutsu!” Kairi intoned after gaining some distance. She let the technique go wide and have Kankuro some space to dodge the cutting blades she sent on.

Then she flicked her fan shut again and dashed forward when the boy was distracted. The folded-up version of Kogonhi slammed against Karasu’s head, smacking it to the ground, thus jerking the chakra strings that Kankuro used and unbalancing the boy. Kanata-san was one of Kairi’s acquaintances in Suna and from him she’d learnt about the weaknesses of the puppet corps and why certain shinobi were paired up with them.

So with Kankuro suitably distracted, Kairi used Soru (the straight-forward version) to get behind him and press a kunai against his jugular.

“Yield!”

“I… I yield.” He didn’t really have other chances. Even if he had Karasu back upright, he’d have to maneuver it behind _her_ in order to attack and in that time she could easily kill him.

 ** _“Kankuro cannot continue, winner is Kairi Fuukatsu.”_** Hayate announced. Kairi let go of her fellow Suna-nin. Her eye lingered briefly on the judge but she departed quickly for the stands then. Kankuro followed her once he had Karasu in the wrappings on his back.

On the stairs Kairi stopped for a moment but didn’t turn around when addressing the boy.

“Kankuro-kun… Thanks.”

* * *

There was no sign of Sasuke or Kakashi yet. Kairi frowned. It couldn’t be because of her though. After all the fact she had her match with Kankuro (albeit short as it was) would’ve bought them more time. So where were those two then?

Down at the arena, Hayate coughed.

**_“The time limit has expired, so I’m officially calling this match-…”_ **

And then there was the telltale hurricane of leaves that came with the more flamboyant version of shunshin.

“Sorry we’re late. You wouldn’t believe the traffic.” One Hatake Kakashi smiled.

“Of course… what did I expect from him?” Kairi muttered dully and leant against the railing once more. She was studiously ignoring the feeling of bloodlust emanating from Gaara. Good thing Temari silenced Kankuro before he managed to inadvertently get killed simply for talking to the younger boy in that state.

Gaara made his way downstairs and to the arena while Hayate explained to rules to Sasuke. Kakashi had already left.

A moment passed and then all three remaining Suna-nin at the balcony flinched when the bloodlust sky-rocketed for a moment.

“What was that?” Temari gasped. “He isn’t even at the arena yet.”

“I don’t know…” Kankuro muttered, sweating heavily.

Kairi in the other hand was flicking through her Archive with rapid speed and… oh. The two Kusa-nin that tried to persuade Gaara to purposefully lose his match against Sasuke because people were betting. How… wasteful.

It was yet another incident where Naruto had realized how dangerous Gaara was in canon. Here though, Shikamaru hadn’t had a match against Temari and he hadn’t forfeited his match. And Kankuro had battled against Kairi before Gaara’s match. So Naruto hadn’t jumped down onto the arena and scolded the Nara boy, thus not met Gaara in the stairway.

How interesting all these cause-effect relationships were… Kairi looked up at the audience and searched for the Konoha genins not participating the finals. She didn’t manage to spot them before the match between Sasuke and Gaara begun.

The match was very much like in canon. The only big addition was yet another water scroll that Sasuke used.

 _“Huh? How did he get that? He’s been with Kakashi the entire time, right?”_ Kairi blinked but snorted then. “Butterflies…”

When Gaara gathered his sand into a cocoon and formed a sandy eye on the wall of the arena, Kairi straightened up. She glanced at the two thirds of Sand siblings who had tensed too. Gaara was early from the plan.

Sasuke retreated to the wall and began going through hand signs. Chidori was being prepared. And with the speed he’d gained during the month of training, it would be interesting to see what it’d look like.

“Damn… Once he’d like this there’s nothing that can be done.” Kankuro muttered.

“Does Gaara want to mess up the plan?” Temari thought aloud.

“It’s not about ‘want’.” Kairi said quietly.

“Huh?”

“Gaara doesn’t care about the plan or the invasion. He just wants blood. When I went to look for him yesterday, he was at the hospital, about to kill his preliminary opponent and three other Konoha’s genins. It was only the promise of blood today that eventually made him come to the strategy meeting.” The green-eyed blonde ran a hand through her ponytail and sighed. “I think he has been going through a great mental and emotional conflict for a long time, if the way he looks at Gai-san and Lee-kun is any indication.”

“What do you mean?” Temari asked slowly, like dreading the answer.

“Gaara is treated like a rabid dog at Suna. Whatever seal that was used on him and Shukaku, has messed him up and the number of assassins going after him aren’t making the situation any better. He doesn’t understand the concept of caring about someone other than himself and even then only to the point of survival. Gai-san saved Lee-kun’s life and he interfered yesterday too. Everyone he meets have bonds with other people. Gaara has only Shukaku and that is not healthy, not with the way he calls it his mother…”

“Mother?” Kankuro asked him disgust. Did he not know? Right, he probably avoided talking with the boy whenever possible.

“The only way I’ve gotten Gaara to back off this far has been through logic. Emotion doesn’t work because he has no one to care for.” Kairi concluded just as Sasuke began running down the wall, lighting in his hand chirping like thousand birds.

**_Chi chi chi chi chi…_ **

The technique had certainly earned its name. And it was very powerful technique. Concentrated lighting, packed into approximate size of a fist. The ultimate chakra conversion into Lighting Element. Kakashi was genius when he developed the technique around the time he became jonin at the age of thirteen and Sasuke was one too, learning the technique in a mere month around the same age.

Sasuke punched through the sand cocoon. There were spikes protruding from the sand formation but ultimately the Uchiha was relatively unharmed.

“No way! Gaara’s absolute defense has been…”

“It can’t be…”

“Hoo…”

The audience, especially of Suna variety were shocked. Kairi quirked a discreet smile and glanced around for the Konoha Anbu stationed in the audience. Things should start running soon.

“UWAAAAA!!! BLOOD… MY… MY BLOOD!!!” Gaara screamed.

It… was chilling. The boy had never been physically harmed due his automatic sand defense. Kairi wasn’t sure what Rasa’s gold sand did though so it was possible that Gaara might’ve been controlled through pain but mostly any abuse the boy had suffered, had been mental and emotional.

“It… It can’t be…” Temari gasped.

Sasuke tore his arm out of the cocoon and dragged ‘Shukaku’s arm’ with him outside.

“Did he transform into his ‘complete’ form?!” Kankuro panicked.

“I don’t know! It looks like he’s been wounded, this has never…” Temari replied.

The bloodlust and chakra pressure skyrocketed.

“Be prepared.” Kairi swallowed. “We might start early.”

The cocoon collapsed then, leaving wounded but fully human Gaara standing in the arena.

“I knew it, a wound! The cocoon was broken while he was still incomplete!”

Then the white feathers started falling. Smoke exploded in the Kagebox. The Operation Konoha Crush had begun.

* * *

The next sequence of events happened quickly. A plume of summoning was seen to rise somewhere outside Konoha’s borders. Anbu were on the move, protecting high-ranked officials and cutting through Kazekage’s bodyguards. Kazekage’s form was seen to take Hokage as hostage and retreat to the roofs where a four-walled barrier rose.

Sound-nin were appearing from the woodwork. Suna forces were probably in the village already.

“Let’s go.” Kairi told the two with her and they jumped down to Gaara. Baki was down there too. And Hayato had stepped to guard Sasuke from the hostiles.

“Gaara, the plan…” Baki began but the jinchuuriki boy was curling into himself in pain.

“I knew it…” Temari said.

“What’s wrong?” Kankuro asked.

“Fool! Trying to transform into your complete form before the signal!” The jonin with them berated to boy.

“He’s experiencing the side-effects. It’s impossible to proceed now.”

“Then what are we supposed to do?! Do it without Gaara?!”

Baki weighted the decision but told the Sand siblings to retreat then.

“Fuukatsu, you have your orders.” He added then, telling Kairi that she was expected to do her part even without the Shukaku distracting the majority of Konoha’s forces.

“Understood.”

The siblings left and Kairi Shunpo’d away, to the wall and towards the audience.

“Kairi!” Someone called. It was Kabuto. Kairi looked up to see black cloak of Anbu speeding towards her with a blur of green chasing after him. Gai.

One step to the right and they passed each other, the spy tossing something baton shaped to her. Another step to the right and Kairi was out of Gai’s reach and she continued her run to the roofs of the dignitary boxes. She glanced at the object she had gotten from Kabuto. A sealing scroll.

“This will be a tough dance, mates.” She muttered and flipped out of the way of some Konoha chuunin ducking it out with Oto-nin. “What a way to spend my birthday…”


End file.
